Lyra Black and the Philosopher's Stone
by IEatLeviathanForBreakfast
Summary: AU- Sirius didn't go to Azkaban, and had a daughter who always will be without a doubt Harry Potter's sister, even if they are not blood related. His story has been told many times, by many people. Now it's time to meet Lyra Black.
1. The Dursleys

**Lyra Black and the Philosopher's Stone**

**A/N - **Hey everyone! Welcome to the new and (hopefully) improved version of Harry, Lyra and the Philosopher's Stone. Just so you know this story will be updated every two weeks. I'm nearly done writing it and I'm trying to stick to the two week schedule. More importantly, I'd like to thank my lovely beta hpfan224. Without her this wouldn't be half the story it is.

**Chapter 1 – The Dursleys **

It was the middle of summer and it was another boiling hot, sunny day. Lyra was sitting dejectedly in the back of her uncle Remus' car. Her older brother Harry was sitting next to her, an expression of dread identical to hers on his face. If she was any other child she would've already thrown a tantrum, she was actually very tempted to do so, just to see how her father and uncle would react.

Neither of them was any good with crying women/girls, they normally freaked out and called her aunt Andy.

She and Harry shared a look that clearly said they'd rather be anywhere but there. In the passenger seat her father Sirius was sitting with his arms crossed stubbornly looking as dread filled as they were, but also very annoyed. He was grumbling under his breath incoherently to himself, Lyra was able to distinguish the phrase 'bloody PMSing arsehole' mentioned a few times though.

Remus, who was driving the car, looked harassed but determined. It was an expression that the other three occupants of the car were quite used to seeing on his face.

Lyra was mourning the wasting of the wonderful, beautiful summer's day, her face now pressed against the window longingly gazing at the clear, cloudless blue sky. She wasn't an awfully outdoorsy person, but still, she'd rather be doing something fun then being dragged off to visit 'relatives'.

With a sigh she thought about how much she _hated_ the Dursleys. Maybe she'd stomp their flowers to death again, it was fun the last time.

The reason for all this was that they were on their way to visit the Dursleys, Harry's aunt Petunia, her husband Vernon – or Vermin as Lyra called him – and their whale of a son Dudley – his nickname was arseface. It was a word Lyra had heard her cousin Tonks use to describe a guy at school on many occasions and decided it fit Dudley perfectly.

Petunia was a tall, thin woman, with twice the amount of neck a normal person had and horse like features. She was a horrible woman who would've been happy to pretend that her sister – Harry's mum – never existed. Lyra had no idea how the two women could've been related. Having seen many pictures of Harry's mum Lily, Lyra thought they couldn't have been more different in looks, or in personality based on the stories her dad and uncle told her.

Vernon Dursley was a big beefy man with practically no neck, he had a fat red face, small watery eyes and a puffy moustache that made him look like an overgrown walrus. Lyra noticed on a few of their visits that he tended to overflow a bit off the edges of their dining room chairs. The first time she noticed that she nearly wet herself laughing, but managed to cover it up as a really bad coughing fit, she knew Remus didn't buy it though.

Dudley was beefy like his father with blond hair that lay flat on his thick head, he was a fat, and lumpy, ugly, spoiled rotten child who Harry often said looked like a pig in a wig. That lovely description cheered Lyra an awful lot when they had to go visit the vile, evil Dursleys. Lyra compared him to a penguin a few times because as far back as she could remember he had waddled rather then walked and was never all that graceful.

They had to visit the Dursleys once every two months because of the agreement that let Sirius and Remus keep Harry even though they weren't blood relatives of either of his parents. The visits were dreaded by everyone involved and they _never_ ended well for anyone.

It was only about four years ago they'd saved Harry from the Dursleys. Dumbledore left Harry with them after Voldemort killed his parents, but they were horrible to him. As soon as Sirius and Remus found out how Harry was being treated they got him away, but the damn ministry said they had to spend the day with the Dursleys every couple of months for some stupid reason.

Lyra and Harry hated those visits more than anyone else forced to take part in them. They were forced most of the time to spend the day with Dudley and his gang of idiots, or him and Pierce Polkiss. Most of the time either Sirius or Remus would end up having to erase someone's memories because Dudley and his morons normally tried to bully Harry and Lyra, and one of the two – mostly Lyra – would end up losing control of their temper and using accidental magic on them or doing something dangerous or stupid.

And if they weren't sent off to "play" by Petunia they had to sit around in the Dursley's sitting room listening to Vernon bark improvements that could be made to the four of them or rant on the incompetence of his workers at his company, Grunnings. This always resulted in Lyra and Harry playing secret games of rock, paper, scissors under the table and more often than not Sirius looked like he'd like to join them.

When once in a while Vermin took it too far with his "improvements" on their family, Sirius usually threw his drink over the heavy man for insulting his family then threatened to turn him into a pig. Safe to say that was Lyra's favourite way to end a day with the Dursleys.

As they pulled into Privet Drive Lyra groaned and hit her head off the seat in front of her in defeat. She was hoping they'd break down or something before they got there. Sadly she just wasn't that lucky. There was a collective groan throughout all the occupants of the car as they stopped in the driveway of number four and Remus cut the engine. It appeared they'd all been hoping _something_ would stop them getting this far.

Remus was the first to exit the car, doing so slightly reluctantly and after taking a deep breath. He then walked around to the passenger door and opened it glaring in at Sirius as if daring him to try and defy him again that day.

"Get out now Padfoot before I drag you out" he threatened crossing his arms seriously. Sirius turned back to the two kids and said

"We're beat Cubs, let's go with Uncle Moony before he gets all PMS on our arses" chuckling as he got out of the car making the two kids laugh too at their uncle's expense. Remus wasn't happy with this at all. A muscle danced in his jaw and Lyra could nearly see a vein throbbing in his forehead.

"For the last time Sirius Black I don't get PMS!" he snapped loudly causing the woman taking groceries out of her car next door to stop dead and stare at the two men and the small children laughing and hanging off them. Remus noticed her staring at them and said much more calmly

"Lovely weather we're having isn't it ma'am? If you'll excuse us we must be going now, business to attend to" and dragged the three children – yes he counted Sirius as a child – howling with laughter into the house, laughing himself at the mortified expression on the woman's face after being caught staring.

Remus rang the doorbell, something that always fascinated Sirius whenever they visited, and waited for someone to answer the door. The door was flung open not a minute later by the overgrown walrus himself, Vermin Dursley. He gave them a horrible forced smile that made Lyra wince; it looked like it hurt him to do that, she sure hoped it did. He shouldn't smile, it made puppies cry.

"Come in, Petunia's in the living room, Dudley's gone at the minute but he'll be back for dinner time" he said with forced politeness.

"Afternoon Vernon. How's the drill thingy going?" Sirius said in his usual bright, cheerful manner even though he didn't care in the slightest, or even fully know what drills were.

He picked up the two kids and carried them into the house smiling at the giggles that came from the two of them. He bounded into the living room with them hanging onto him for dear life. Remus followed in a much more subdued manner shaking his head at Sirius' retreating form.

"It's more like I've got three children" he muttered to himself, "Hello Vernon, thanks for having us. We would have you over for once instead, but I'm afraid you wouldn't like Potter Manor much, too many things to do with the "m" word around" he said with a smirk at the other man's reaction to the mention of magic.

He then walked to the living room briskly to make sure Sirius didn't do anything stupid.

They lived at Potter Manor because that's where Sirius considered home rather then one of the many Black houses. He rented out all the other Potter and Black properties since they didn't need them. All except Black Manor, where his grandparents used to live, that was set up as a safe house – just in case.

Vernon followed Remus acting a lot less pleasant, and as though the mere thought of setting foot in Potter Manor was enough to make him sick.

They all sat around the living room sipping tea that Petunia set out for them with a dreadfully fancy looking tea set that had Lyra itching to have a 'clumsy moment' and drop it on the floor and break it just to see the look on her face. What made her hate it even more was the fact that it was probably the most pinkish, girly tea set she had ever laid eyes on. And that's really saying something, her aunts and cousins on her mother's side brought her into Madam Puddifoot's teashop in Hogsmeade. Lyra shivered in disgust at the mere thought of that place.

After a stern look from Moony threatening severe punishment if she dared to do it she gave upon that plan, and instead pouted and acted like a good little girl for once. It wasn't fun.

To break the awkward silence after about ten awful minutes Petunia decided to ask "Where is Harry going to school in September?" in an obviously forced pleasant manner

"He's been enrolled at Hogwarts since he was born" Sirius answered, "The letters with the book list and stuff should be sent out in a few days"

"Is Dumbledore still the headmaster?" she asked

"Yes, most of the staff is still the same as when Lily attended, there's only been a few changes" Remus told her.

They didn't know much about Hogwarts, this had to be one of only a few times the subject had been brought up with the Dursleys. Frankly Lyra was shocked Petunia was talking about it. The last time the famous school had been brought up was in a highly memorable bellowing match between Sirius and Vermin.

"Oh? Would I know any of the staff?" she asked and Lyra nearly dropped her cup in shock.

She steadied herself before that happened and looked at Harry and Sirius; they both looked as taken aback as she did. Remus, thankfully, was a lot more composed and after a second of surprise answered her question.

"You may have met Professor McGonagall, she normally explains the situation to muggle-borns and their families" he told her and she looked like she was straining her memory to try and remember something.

"Does she wear green clothes and square glasses…very stern?" she asked

"Yes, that's her" Remus said and Petunia nodded.

"Yes, she came with Lily's letter. Anyone else I might know of?"

"Severus Snape?" Remus asked, "He used to be a friend of Lily's when she was in school. He teaches Potions now"

"I know him, he used to live near us" she said taking another sip of her tea.

Sirius and Remus looked surprised by that but quickly got over it after sharing a peculiar look that Lyra raised her eyebrow at, though neither of them noticed her. It was then that Vermin decided to change the direction of the conversation. He was probably hoping to criticise the two men on something or other.

"What do you do for a living?" he asked them out of the blue. Sirius seemed to be expecting that question though and rolled his eyes discreetly to Lyra and Harry causing them to giggle quietly and have to try and hide their smiles behind their bloody awful teacups.

"I teach at Hogwarts" Remus told them and had to stop himself smirking at the look on Vermin's face, the man had been hoping for something he could give out about.

Sadly for the walrus teaching was a perfectly respectable job. He then turned to Sirius probably hoping for an answer like 'I'm unemployed'.

"I'm what you would call a detective, and I have a few properties I rent out" he told them and their ears perked up at the word propert**ies**.

He smirked slightly and changed the subject effortlessly. This went on all day and Lyra was getting really, really bored. _Bad things_ normally happened when she got bored.

It became apparent almost immediately after she'd been brought home from St Mungo's that Lyra had, to the horror of almost everyone other then Sirius, taken after her father and loved pulling jokes on everyone she came across. Harry had taken after James a little in that respect too, but he was a lot more sensible then the younger of the two tended to be.

So whenever the two of them were bored or couldn't think of anything else to do they'd figure out some way to entertain themselves, nearly always at someone else's expense.

This was stopped from happening that day by Dudley arriving home earlier then expected. Sirius, knowing some kind of disaster would be in the making if the two kids were kept inside for any longer, sent them outside as soon as Dudley had said hello to his parents.

He and Remus shared a sigh of relief as the two kids jumped off their seats and ran from the room, glad to be out of there, even if their company ruined the mood more then a bit.

Dudley waddled out after them as fast as his legs could carry him, he was eager to have a go at his favourite punching bag, but Harry was prepared for this and jumped the garden wall with Lyra right behind him.

"You're not allowed in there" Dudley called from inside the garden as the other two ran around next door's garden. They looked at him with identically mischievous grins.

"We were told to go play outside, they didn't specify where outside we were to play" Lyra said and high-fived Harry who stuck his tongue out at Dudley.

"I saw a playground at the end of the street" Harry said excitedly to Lyra, "How bout we go there for a while. We've to be back for dinner though so they won't notice we've gone"

"Okay" Lyra said and they ran back into the Dursley's garden, then into their neighbour's on the other side.

They ran through all the gardens of Privet Drive, with Dudley following slowly behind them looking livid – Lyra had thrown a handful of dirt from the neighbour's flowerbed at him as they passed him – until they reached the playground Harry saw earlier.

It was a nice enough place, painted in bright colours but was kinda crowded, there were a few small children screaming at their parents, and one or two toddlers bawling their eyes out for some reason or other.

Harry ran for the swings while they were free and grabbed one. Lyra ran after him, not being able to keep up with him very well since she was small and Harry was very fast, laughing and flung herself down onto the swing next to him just before a boy who looked big, mean and grumpy got to it.

"Hey that's my swing!" he shouted at her, "Get off it"

"I don't see your name on it" Lyra shot back to his demand and stuck her tongue out at him cheekily. He raised his fist to hit her but she was quicker and lashed out with her foot, catching him in the shin. He yelped and grabbed his leg, rubbing where she'd hit him.

"Don't try and hit me again or I'll kick the crap out of you" she threatened him in a dangerous sounding voice that you wouldn't expect to come from a little girl like her, "Now move out of my way".

He moved and the serene, childish smile returned to her face again as she started swinging with Harry. They had a competition to see who could go the highest. Harry was winning and laughing at Lyra cause she was too little to go very high at all without anyone pushing her – she was quite small for her age. She pouted at him and squeezed her eyes shut tightly. The swing started moving higher into the air and she was going as high as, even higher then, Harry.

"That's cheating!" he cried chuckling at her.

"I don't know what you're talking about" she said back innocently

"Uncle Moony told you not to do that in front of the Muggles" Harry reminded her and she shrugged as she swung

"What uncle Moony doesn't know won't hurt him – or me" she answered and grinned brazenly at him, an expression that made her look just like a more feminine little clone of her father.

It was only then that Dudley approached them, it took him long enough. They ignored him until he grabbed Harry's swing as he was about to go up and nearly made him fall off and land flat on his face. He got off the swing and glared at Dudley, daring his cousin to try and do anything else to him.

Lyra stopped too and sat on her swing watching not Dudley and Harry, but the group of boys Harry hadn't noticed yet. There was four of them and they were all coming to stand in a semi-circle around her and Harry. She recognised one of them as Piers. And another as the boy she kicked a few minutes ago. Lyra could only guess this wasn't going to go well.

She stood up next to Harry and tapped his shoulder. She motioned her head at the boys now surrounding them. Harry looked at all of them and turned back to Dudley with a smirk on his face.

"You couldn't even take on your cousin and a little girl without your gang Dudley, that's pathetic, even for you" he said shaking his head sadly. Lyra couldn't stop the chuckle that came out at that. Dudley glared at her for that.

"You think something's funny, do you?" he asked stupidly.

"Obviously, I'd say it was your face, but that's too terrifyingly disgusting to be funny" she told him honestly, blame her vocabulary on Remus' influence, "They should start a charity to get you what you call it…plastic surgery – that's it"

He didn't like that, the frown coming back to his chubby face, "What are you talking about ugly. You're so ugly you crack mirrors" he and his gang laughed but Lyra just crossed her arms stubbornly over her chest and raised an eyebrow at him.

She hoped she'd sound braver then she felt at the moment, cause it was hard not to be afraid when you're surrounded by five guys a hell of a lot bigger and stronger then you are.

"If you're going to insult me don't try and say I'm ugly. I know I'm not ugly and you know it too Dinky Duddydums" she retorted using a nickname she'd heard Petunia use when she turned him purple on their last visit.

Lyra wasn't being overly vain or cocky saying that, the young girl was far from ugly. She had inherited the typical aristocratic beauty that the Black family was always known for. Lyra had the dark hair, her's slightly curly and down nearly to her hip, pale skin, strong features and the slim build. She also had her father's piercing, unfathomable grey eyes and his signature roguish grin.

The use of the nickname had made Dudley's face go a dangerous shade of plum and his fists were clenched in fury. He wanted to hit her; she could tell he wanted to hit her with everything in him. But he wouldn't hit a girl in front of his gang because that would lose him all respect, sinking so low.

Knowing he wasn't going to do anything she smiled smugly and grabbed Harry's arm and started towing him away.

"If that's all Popkin I think we'll be going back now, dad and uncle Moony will be getting worried about us" she said using another of Petunia's ridiculous nicknames and walked away leaving the bully to be laughed at by his own gang.

"That was bloody brilliant!" Harry shouted once they were over the garden wall and on their way back to number four. "I can't believe you called him Dinky Duddydums" he said laughing.

"Neither can I" Lyra told him, holding onto his hand as he helped her over the next wall which was for some reason way taller than the others. When she reached the other side she didn't let go, neither did he. They always held hands when they walked. Tonks – Lyra's older cousin who was in her last year at Hogwarts – always teased them about looking like a cute little couple.

"We probably shouldn't tell uncle Padfoot and Moony about that though" Harry said sadly, "They'd freak out and uncle Padfoot might try and turn Dudley into a pig again"

"Aww, come on can we tell them?" Lyra asked, "Being a pig would be such an improvement for Dudley. I think he'd like it"

"No, he'd get arrested – or he'd have to arrest himself – whichever" Harry said shaking his head as they stopped in the garden next to the Dursley's.

Sirius was the Auror captain at the ministry, but if he put half the stuff he does on his record he'd definitely have to put himself under arrest – things like letting the Lyra and Harry do magic at Potter Manor because the ministry couldn't detect anything there, modifying his muggle motorbike to fly and do loads of other cool stuff, and lots of things like that. How he was made Auror captain no one will ever know.

Lyra sighed in defeat and climbed over the Dursley's low garden wall and walked back into the spotless, gleaming kitchen.

The kitchen at Potter Manor was clean as a whistle too, but Lyra didn't like this kitchen, it was cold and unfeeling. The one back home was warm and inviting and always – and I mean always – smelled like something delicious the elves had cooked up for a snack, even at three in the morning. They always left something out for a midnight snack on the weekends when Harry and Lyra would sneak down for something.

Lyra didn't like this kitchen, or any part of the Dursley's house. She was eager to leave it but something caught her eye. There was something on the counter that looked like it didn't belong there, or in this household even. It was a folded piece of parchment with writing on it.

The fact that the parchment was there was weird in itself, because even though Lyra was no genius when it came to Muggles, even she knew that they had – what did you call it – oh yeah, paper.

It looked like an opened letter from the magical world, there was even a broken wax seal on it. She was about to read it when Harry called her from out in the hall. Instead she grabbed it and stuffed it in her pocket to read later. Hurrying out to the living room where Harry just went she wondered who'd be writing to the Dursleys from the wizarding world.

"Have fun?" Sirius asked as they sat down on either side of him. That really meant 'did you do anything to Dudley?'

"A little" they answered together. Remus shook his head at them and Sirius grinned childishly.

"Where is Dudders" Petunia asked suspiciously. Harry shrugged

"He was with a few of his friends when we came back inside" he told her honestly and smirked at Lyra when she turned away.

Vermin was about to say something about dinner when an owl came whooshing in through the chimney. The two Muggles freaked out while the four wizards just wondered why someone was sending the Dursleys a letter.

The barn owl stopped at Sirius and dropped a letter on his lap before flying back out the chimney not waiting for a reply. Looking puzzled he opened the letter and scanned through it. He sighed and turned to Remus.

"Its work Moony, there's been a situation with Dolohov, and Mad-eye needs me to come in" he said frowning. Remus nodded frowning as well and they both got to their feet immediately.

"Sorry about this, but Dolohov and his lackeys are a nasty bunch, we need to go take care of that" Remus told the Dursleys, who looked relieved that their guests weren't going to be staying any longer.

The four piled into the car quickly and took off from the house – with Sirius driving this time – dangerously quickly. They drove down the street like they were in a chase scene from a muggle cop movie and Sirius swung around the corner honked the horn at the Dursleys and took off down the next street.

When they were well away from the Dursleys he started laughing his head off and Remus joined him.

"I'd love to go back and see the looks on their faces after that" Remus managed to get out between fits of laughter.

"I know, it'd be priceless. Now who wants ice-cream?" Sirius yelled and got a round of cheers from the kids who were delighted to get away from the Dursleys early. "I'll take that as everyone" he said

"I thought you had to go into work Uncle Padfoot" Harry said as they drove at a slightly more reasonable speed down the streets of Little Whinging

"No. I got Mad-eye to agree to send that before four so we could get out of there early" Sirius said looking proud of himself.

"Now, where around here serves chocolate ice-cream?" Remus asked rubbing his hands together gleefully.

Remus Lupin was completely and totally obsessed with chocolate and often ate more than anyone should. It was practically an addiction, though he always denied he was that bad. Easter was always a…interesting…holiday in their household. Especially since Sirius loved the egg hunts and hid chocolate all around the manor every year.

They finally found an ice-cream bar and got a cone each, Remus' full of chocolate ice-cream with chocolate sauce on top. As they sat around in the sun eating Lyra felt the letter in her pocket.

She wanted to read it now, but knew that if she took it out in front of her dad or uncle they'd probably take it away from her and she'd never figure out what it was about. Unless she stole it back from them and read it then. But that was an awful lot of effort to put in and she still had it, being stupid would only slow her down.

When they got back to the manor Remus parked the car next to Sirius' motorbike and their other car. They didn't use that one when they went to visit the Muggles. Sirius said that he didn't want them know they had money, if they did they'd try to suck up and get something from him every time they had to visit. And that car made it obvious that he had a lot of money.

As soon as they were back in the house Lyra dashed to her room to read the letter she found at the Dursleys. She slammed the door shut and locked it. She took the letter out of her cardigan pocket and threw off the cardigan. Curling up on her big king-sized bed clad in violet sheets – her favourite colour – she folded open the letter and began to read the narrow loopy writing. It said

_Petunia,_

_Harry will be attending Hogwarts this year. I hope you didn't forget our agreement. I will discuss it with you on the 27__th__. _

_Albus Dumbledore. _

Lyra stared at the letter – more like a note – for a full minute trying to figure out why Dumbledore would be writing to Petunia Dursley, one of the biggest Muggles she'd ever met. It had something to do with Harry anyway, that was something to start with.

She bit her lip out of an old habit as she thought and threw the letter down on the bed in frustration.

She was about to go across the hall to Harry's room to tell him about it when there was a knock on her door. Lyra quickly stuffed the note under her pillow and ran over to unlock the door.

Her dad was leaning against the doorframe with his usual casual kind of elegance and smiling at her. He pulled her into a hug and ruffled her hair.

"Why don't you come down and play with me?" he asked cheerfully. Lyra beamed and nodded enthusiastically.

"Come on then Pup" Sirius said playfully putting an arm around Lyra's shoulders and walked with her downstairs to the drawing room.

He sat down with her on the bench in front of the sleek black grand piano and started to play. Lyra played along too, and soon she forgot all about the weird letter from Dumbledore.


	2. I'm a Freak, Aren't I?

**Lyra Black and the Philosopher's Stone**

**A/N -** Hello lovely readers! I hope you enjoy the second installment of the Lyra Black series. I'd just like to thank my wonderful beta, hpfan224. This story wouldn't be anything much without her. :)

**Chapter 2 – I'm A Freak Aren't I?**

That day with the Dursleys was the last one before Harry went off to Hogwarts. From now on they'd only have to go see them once while Harry was home from school during the holidays. That was the only positive Lyra could come up with for Harry going to school in September. The rest was all terrible.

Since Moony was teaching there he was going to be gone too. He normally came home in the evenings he wasn't patrolling or things like that and on weekends, but Harry wouldn't be able to do that.

Lyra loved her dad, but the thought of it being only the two of them in the house most of the time was a bit depressing. Who was going to talk her out of blowing up the kitchen now? Who was going to help her control her infamous temper? Her dad had always and ever failed at doing that, him being where she got said temper from.

And what would she do when her dad was at work in the ministry? He couldn't bring her with him; the Auror department was considered too high risk for a child to be in during his shifts. She'd end up being left alone nearly all day with the house elves. She hoped it didn't come to that because if it did Lyra was sure she'd go totally insane.

The way Lyra saw it, the house was going to be in ruins by the time Harry came home for Christmas.

She was already feeling desperately lonely, leading to her setting off a bunch of dungbombs in the living room to try and cheer herself up, and Harry hadn't even left yet. Lyra supposed it had something to do with it being Harry's eleventh birthday today.

Today was the day he would get his Hogwarts letter making the fact that he was leaving her behind all the more real.

The night before Lyra's temper had gotten the better of her while her dad and uncle were talking to Harry about how much he was going to love the castle. She ended up accidentally demolishing a wall in the sitting room and stormed up to her room before she could do something worse.

How could Harry leave without her? They'd always been together, they were a package deal. That's the way things are. A while ago he even promised to try and sneak her into the castle in his trunk for Merlin's sake!

She knew that wasn't going to happen, but Harry didn't want to leave without her either. At least she thought he didn't. No. She _knew_ he didn't want to go to Hogwarts without her. She had seen the sad lilt in his eyes whenever her dad or Moony brought up the subject. He hid it well from them, they were caught up in their own memories and excitement, but he couldn't hide it from Lyra. She knew him better then she knew herself.

In reality she was angrier at Dumbledore then anyone else. That wasn't exactly a new development but it was one she was good at hiding, even from Harry who could normally read her like a book.

She was a hell of a lot smarter then the old man gave her credit for. Lyra knew that he was watching her, and that he had her Aunt Min and Hagrid doing the same every time they came to the Manor. She had even overheard Min talking to her dad and Uncle Remus about her.

There was something wrong with her, and they wouldn't tell her what. All she knew was that there was something wrong with her magical core; it was developing too quickly according to Min. She overheard their conversation about her six months ago while she was supposed to be asleep and apparently she was more developed power-wise then most third years at Hogwarts.

Her temper made things even worse for her, with all the accidental magic it resulted in. The effects of which were getting more and more severe. Long story short, Lyra was dangerous, and as far as she could tell no one really knew why, or how to stop her getting worse.

If anyone did know though, it was Dumbledore. But the old silver haired man tended to only tell you what you needed to know right before disaster happened. It drove her mad that he's been spying on her like she was some sort of lab rat and now he was taking her brother away from her.

She wanted to punch him right in the face. Or maybe just rig his chair to disappear whenever he tries to sit on it. He was going to be at the house later to see Harry for his birthday and all, so maybe she'd be able to get him then.

Lately her pranks on the headmaster had been getting more and more elaborate and hazardous. But the old man always just chuckled, patted her on the head and told her that she would make her father very proud when she finally got to Hogwarts.

Lyra growled viciously, sounding very like Moony did when he was angry coming up to the full moon. She punched the cushion she was holding in her lap hard enough that she ended up hitting her own leg too. Huffing out an angry breath she turned to look out the window she was sitting at.

From her huge bay window she had an excellent view of the grounds of the manor. They were really beautiful, with lovely clusters of different flowers scattered around the long expanses of grass, a large pond near the middle of the back garden, and in the distance there were hills that were covered from head to toe in wild looking trees. She could even see the river that ran through the grounds near the foot of the hills.

The beauty of her home was lost on her this morning, partly because she was up so damn early – last time she checked it was six in the morning – and that in itself was basically a crime in Lyra's book, and partly because she was so damn _angry_ that she wanted all of it to just catch fire.

Why couldn't she have been born a year earlier?

As she continued to glare out the window here eyes fell upon the broom shed and she remembered three years ago when Harry brought her out there in the middle of the night and convinced her that to get over her fear of heights she had to go up really, really high.

Since she hated being afraid of anything Lyra had foolishly agreed, and being only seven years old didn't think of the fact that neither she nor Harry had ever flown anything other then a toy broom before.

_That_ was a catastrophe if there ever was one. They both ended up in St Mungo's, Lyra for over a week, and she hasn't gone near a broom since.

That broom shed had brought her nothing but trouble, so it wasn't all that much of a surprise that her glare intensified to skin melting level when she looked at it. What _was_ unexpected though was that the shed caught on fire. Lyra gave a yell of surprise and nearly fell off her window seat.

She quickly got over the shock and ran from her room and dashed through the house, down the ornate staircase, and out into the back garden where the shed was still ablaze with red hot flames. Lyra was panicking by now.

"What do I do?" she screeched.

If only it was raining, or she was closer to the lake, she might be able to use that to put out the fire. Right now though, she had nothing.

The more she panicked the more out of control the fire got. Snapping her fingers triumphantly she realised that she was still controlling the flames, so she could put them out. She remembered Remus telling her about those kinds of flames before, the spell was controlled by the caster only they could put it out.

So how _did_ she put it out?

Luckily Remus' room also overlooked the back gardens and he's a very light sleeper from his time sharing a dorm room with Sirius and James.

He woke up when he heard the yelling coming from Lyra's room and the slamming of doors. When he looked out the window his eyes immediately fell upon the sight of the shed on fire and billowing smoke into the air and the ten year old who was as good as his own daughter standing _way_ too close to it.

"Lyra what are you doing?" he yelled at her, "Get back from there!"

"How do I put it out Uncle Moony?" she yelled back to him frantically.

"You just stay here and don't even try to go near that fire" he told her sternly as he pulled her back to a safe distance away from the fire and used an Aguamenti spell to try and put out the fire.

"But Uncle Moony I have to stop it. Water won't work!" Lyra called to him over the noise of the roaring fire.

"What?" Remus asked her shocked, nearly dropping his wand

"How do I stop it?" Lyra practically shrieked, panic stricken, at her uncle again and he ran back to her side and lowered himself so he was at her eyelevel.

"It's alright Pup, just try and calm down" he said soothingly using the nickname she'd had since she was a baby. It worked about 90% of the time when something bad happened with her magic or she was mad at someone.

Lyra did as he said taking deep calming breaths and avoided looking at the fire. When she felt it was less likely that her heart would beat right out of her chest she looked back up into her uncle's kind amber eyes and felt exactly like she was back in the house having a magic lesson with him and not after setting some of her dad's most prized possessions on fire.

"There, now just keep calm and you can make the flames go away. Just focus on the shed without the fire" he told her and she closed her eyes and did as she was told, an incredibly rare occasion.

When she opened her eyes this time the shed looked exactly as it did before she glared it into flames. She let out a sigh of relief. Remus put a hand on her shoulder and stood up. He walked with her to the door of the shed and looked around inside at all the brooms and Quidditch equipment.

"It's alright, you didn't get anything else" Remus reassured Lyra who breathed another sigh of relief, as did Remus.

No one wanted to deal with Sirius and Harry after something Quidditch related got damaged.

"How did you do it?" he asked her, honestly curious

Lyra shrugged "I don't know. I was looking out my window, I looked at the shed and remembered the night Harry took me up on dad's broom, then next thing I knew the shed was on fire"

Remus sighed again looking haggard, like something had been troubling him for quite a while.

"Come on back inside Pup, I'll make you some breakfast" they walked back into the house and Lyra noticed that she must've woken her uncle up because he was still in his pyjamas and dressing gown.

Harry, being the dreaded phenomenon known as a 'morning person', came into the kitchen stretching while Remus was still making their pancakes.

"Morning" he said pleasantly.

"Happy birthday Harry" Lyra said yawning from where she was sitting with her head on the table, half asleep again. Her brother laughed at her and she sent him a glare before remembering what happened to the last thing she glared at and groaned to herself.

"Here you go" Remus said as he placed two plates loaded with pancakes down in front of the two.

"Thanks Uncle Moony" they said in unison and Remus smiled at them.

"Happy birthday Harry" he said and patted Lyra on the shoulder giving her a sympathetic look as she reluctantly dragged her head up so she could eat her breakfast. Pancakes were the only thing she would give up going back to sleep for this early in the morning.

Harry sent Remus a look that asked 'what happened now?'

"There was a bit of an incident with her magic again" he whispered to Harry and he grimaced thinking _not again_.

"I heard that" Lyra said then viciously stabbed the pancakes with her fork.

Remus silently cursed the fact that she heard like a bat. Now he'd have to make a lot more pancakes to get back into her good books, or maybe give her some chocolate from his stash.

Later on the four of them were sitting around the fire after a treacle tart binge about to open Harry's presents. Lyra was in a much better mood after eating enough sugar to nearly rot the teeth out of her head. Sirius was about to say something when the fire roared and the flames turned from the warm reds and oranges it normally was to bright emerald green.

They all moved back and sat on the couch and chairs as a woman walked out of the fireplace and dusted off some soot that was left on her robes as if appearing out of a fireplace was a perfectly normal, everyday occurrence.

By the lack of shock on the four occupants of the house's faces it seemed it in fact was.

"Hi Aunt Min" Harry said from his spot next to Lyra on the couch and stood up so the woman could hug him.

"Hello Harry" she said warmly as she pulled away from him, "Happy birthday"

This woman was Minerva McGonagall, or as she was more commonly called by Lyra and Harry, Min. She was the Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts and not a woman you wanted to cross. Minerva was an incredibly talented witch, especially in Transfiguration which she taught at Hogwarts. She was so skilled that she was renowned as one of the greatest witches of the age.

Minerva was relatively tall with black greying hair that she always had tied up into a tight bun. She was very strict with her students and a fan of tough love. She did have a soft side though, but it wasn't something her students ever saw. It was reserved for her godchild, Harry, and her grand nieces and nephews, all of whom she loved dearly.

"Lyra" she said with a warm smile as she greeted her youngest grand niece with a hug too, "You haven't blown anything up lately have you?" Lyra only smiled innocently at the question and Minerva shook her head fondly.

"No hug for me Minnie?" Sirius said pouting dramatically. Minerva turned to him giving him a sharp look

"How many times have I told you, Sirius Black, not to call me Minnie?"

"I lost count" he shrugged and Minerva threw her eyes up towards the ceiling as if to ask 'why me?'

"I do believe, Minerva, that it is in the late hundreds by now" said someone who had just stepped out of the fire in time to hear that.

Albus Dumbledore was standing in front of the fire with a small smile on his face looking at them all from over the top of his half moon glasses, his silver beard a bit longer then the last time Lyra had seen him. It was now more then long enough to tuck into his belt.

Once everyone was settled in the chairs and couches around the fire Sirius loudly declared it was time for presents nearly bouncing in his seat with excitement. Remus slapped him upside the head and told him to stop acting like a child, and that the presents were for Harry, not him.

From their Aunt Min Harry got a brand new wizard's chess set.

"Since you're always planning something I thought you could use your talent at strategising in a less destructive way. I won't tolerate you turning people's beds into catapults, or whatever you decide to come up with, when you're one of my students" she said giving him a warning look along with the gift.

"That's not a bad idea. Thanks Aunt Min!" Harry said with an evil smirk as Minerva face-palmed.

She had also brought along a gift from Hagrid, who was busy trying to deliver a letter to a muggle-born student whose parents were convinced they were con artists or it was all an elaborate hoax of some sort.

Lyra didn't know _what_ it was at first, and neither did Harry so it seemed. Luckily they had three teachers and an Auror there who _did_ know what it was.

"That's a Chimaera tooth Harry" Remus told them, it didn't seem to explain much though by the looks on his and Lyra's faces,

"They're incredibly rare and they have magical properties that differ for each one of the creatures" he continued explaining and they both nodded their heads at the same time, fascinated by the big, oddly shaped, gnarled tooth that looked like some kind of fang.

From Dumbledore Harry got a small pile of things from Zonko's joke shop, there were enough Dungbombs, Stink Pellets, Ever-bashing boomerangs and Belch Powder to keep both Harry and Lyra happy for a long while. Minerva, however, was less then happy with this gift judging by the glare she sent at the headmaster.

"I thought you might enjoy those, but I wouldn't advise using them on our poor caretaker again" he said with a chuckle, referring to the time Harry and Lyra went to the school for a Quidditch match and ended up setting off a bunch of dungbombs in Filch's office because he yelled at them for rule-breaking. Even though they weren't students and therefore didn't have to abide by the rules.

Now it was Remus' turn to give Harry his present. So with a grin he pulled a cage from behind his chair and showed it to Harry who gasped. Inside the cage was the most beautiful snowy owl with the biggest, most intelligent amber eyes Lyra had ever seen on an owl.

"Is she really for me uncle Moony?" Harry said in an awed voice.

Harry had always wanted an owl and had expressed this many, many times over the past few years. But since he had no real need for an owl he had to stick with their family owl, Amun-Ra.

Lyra had named him; she had a fascination with the ancient Egyptian wizards and the gods they worshiped.

"She sure is Cub" Remus said and handed Harry the cage.

He opened it at once and set the beautiful creature free. She spread her wings and flew around the room once before landing on Harry's outstretched arm.

"I love her Moony!" Harry exclaimed delightedly stroking the soft feathers of the bird's snowy white head.

When it came to her dad all he said was, "I'll show you my present later Cub" and winked at Harry, leaving Lyra very confused, Minerva incredibly weary, Dumbledore smiling to himself and Remus trying not to laugh at Minerva's dread filled expression.

The rest of the evening was spent playing a wizard's chess tournament – Harry ended up being beaten by Minerva in the final – and many, many games of exploding snap, a game Sirius and Remus got surprisingly competitive about. Though thankfully not nearly as competitive as they got during the Great Prank War of 89.

There was a never ending flow of stories from all the adults present about the things they'd done during their school days, and even in their early years of employment. Sirius even told them all about the pranks the young 'newbie' Aurors had played on Mad-Eye Moody and how he exploded at them for every single one.

"That explains why he's always yelling about 'Constant Vigilance!" Remus commented doing a very good impression of the older Auror.

It was night time before anything out of the ordinary happened.

Lyra was going to the kitchen to get something to drink for herself when she heard two people talking in there. She knew it was her Uncle Moony and Dumbledore; they'd gone off a little while ago because Remus wanted to talk to Dumbledore about something 'urgent'.

So Lyra, being the budding Marauder she was decided not to do the smart thing and pretend she never heard anything, turn around and walk away.

Instead she looked through the key hole and listened in.

Remus was pacing back and forth in front of the kitchen table, where Dumbledore was sitting on one of the simple wooden chairs looking as frustrated and worried as her uncle. That was a bit of a shock for her, she had never seen Dumbledore look so anxious. And if something troubled someone like Dumbledore enough for him to look visibly apprehensive, then it was something big.

"I told you Dumbledore, it's not getting any better, it's getting worse and worse if anything. It's hard enough to control something when you know what's going on, but Lyra doesn't have a clue, she thinks what she can do is normal" Remus said stopping and facing the headmaster.

Lyra blinked in surprise. It was _her_ that had the both of the so worried? Why?

"I'm sure it's not that bad Remus" Dumbledore tried to interject but Remus cut him off before he could say anything else.

"Dumbledore, she set the shed on fire by _looking_ at it while thinking about the time she fell off the broom Harry convinced her to go on" Remus said, "And if I wasn't there to help her I don't know what she would've done. She was panicking and the fire was starting to get out of control. The whole house could've gone up in flames if I hadn't helped her calm down"

"I know that Remus, but what do you suggest we do about it?"

"You know what I'm going to say to that Albus" Remus said giving the elder man a hard glare, "I told you she should've started learning to control her magic properly years ago. The odd lesson Sirius and I are able to give her isn't doing anything for her"

Dumbledore sighed heavily, "She is too young, and you can't expect to put so much weight on her shoulders"

"You have to stop treating her like she's the little four year old girl who turned your beard green Albus. I would never do anything that wasn't in either her's or Harry's best interests. Lyra is capable of much more then you give her credit for" Remus said raising his voice, which was as close to yelling as the werewolf ever got in Lyra's experience.

"I don't know about this Remus" Dumbledore said uncertainly

"Albus, if she's left alone she'll get bored and there's a whole library upstairs that she can get at. I know Sirius has protections around the more dangerous books, but she's gotten past them once before without even trying, she can and will do it again. She will start doing magic unsupervised and that could turn out very badly for her, she could get seriously hurt"

"Wouldn't the house elves be able to keep her out of serious danger?"

"No, she's just as much a charmer as Sirius always was"

Dumbledore chuckled at that, "She certainly is her father's daughter"

"She definitely is, which is why I know I'm right about this"

"How do you think Sirius would feel about this?"

"He wants what's best for his daughter"

"And separating her from her brother wouldn't be best" Dumbledore said in a knowing way

"No, it wouldn't" Remus answered simply, "He's the only one who can calm her down when she starts to loose control. I got _extremely_ lucky this morning"

"We shall have to talk with Sirius and Minerva about this" Dumbledore said sounding a bit defeated. It looked like Remus had won whatever argument they were having about her.

The old headmaster got up and Remus turned towards the door.

_Shit! _Lyra thought as she scrambled as quietly as she could away from the door. Looking around frantically for a place she could hide without making too much noise Lyra spotted a linen closet and quickly slipped into it and pulled the door over so it was open just a crack. She left it so that it was open just enough for her to see out through but not enough that Dumbledore or her uncle could see in.

The two men exited the kitchen and Lyra waited until they'd turned the corner and their footsteps had faded away to nothing before she came out of the closet. Briefly distracted from the matter at hand Lyra snickered to herself thinking_ I came out of the closet_. A term that Tonks had explained to her a little while ago.

She got over her amusement pretty soon though and slid down the wall so she was sitting on the floor beside the door.

There really and truly _was_ something wrong with her. And it was ghastly enough that it had the Albus Dumbledore nearly biting his nails with worry, and to make her uncle Moony nearly have a bitch fit at the headmaster who he respected greatly. That was just fantastic news.

What were they talking about?

She had been reading the books in their library for years – she was more studious then her father but hated magical theory so she skipped those parts of the books – why was there a problem with that now all of a sudden?

Most importantly, what were they going to do with her?

How were they going to keep her with Harry?

Was there the _slightest_ possibility Moony was trying to get her into Hogwarts that September?

She couldn't answer a single question, but she was going to and that meant a lot more snooping around. It also meant she would need her partner in crime in on it too. Whatever they were hiding from her, she _would_ find them out.


	3. PaintBalling Gone Wrong

**Lyra Black and the Philosopher's Stone**

**A/N -** Hello again my lovely readers! I'd just like to say helloooo to my very own Tristan Taylor, Sick Of Being Labelled. This chapter's for you since you finally got your arse online. And, of course, thanks to my beta hpfan224 for all her hard work dealing with me and this story. It hasn't been easy.

**Chapter 3 – Paint-Balling Gone Wrong**

Lyra had decided not to tell Harry about what she overheard the night of his birthday until later. He was so happy that night she couldn't do anything to bring his spirits down. She tried to act normal for the rest of the night, like she hadn't heard a word that had been said between Remus and Dumbledore. But that was hard to do when she kept going over the conversation in her mind whenever it wasn't otherwise occupied with playing games and talking to her aunt.

The next day however she couldn't keep it to herself any longer. Lyra and Harry never kept secrets from each other, which is how she knew he'd tell her what her dad had given him then too.

So after breakfast her and Harry had a less than ten second silent conversation and raced upstairs to his room before either of the adults in the room could say or do anything.

The moment the door was closed behind them Lyra said "You go first" to Harry pointing at him for emphasis and leaving no room for argument.

"Alright" Harry said excitedly and pulled something out of the trunk at the end of his bed.

Lyra raised an eyebrow at it; it was just a regular cloak, one that looked far too big for Harry too. She didn't find it all that amazing as Harry seemed to, that is, until he put it on. He threw the cloak around his shoulders and the second he did so he disappeared. Lyra sat totally still on Harry's bed for nearly a full minute gaping open-mouthed at the spot where Harry vanished.

"NO BLOODY WAY!" she yelled and Harry pulled down the hood so she could see his face. "An invisibility cloak!"

"I know" Harry said jumping on the spot once to let out his excitement.

"How did dad get it? They're so rare" Lyra asked still looking awed as Harry took off the cloak and gave it to her to inspect it. It felt smoother then silk in her hands, like water woven into material.

"He said it was my dad's and it's been passed down from father to son for generations" Harry told her then grinned evilly, "Its brilliant Ly, I used it hide Moony's chocolate stash last night"

"He's gonna kill you when he finds out it was you who hid it" Lyra told him laughing at the thought of the frantic state their uncle had been in that morning after he realised his stash was missing.

"I know it's worth it though" he shrugged casually, "Now it's your turn, what's been bothering you?"

"It's a long story" she said then sighed and launched into the story of how she caught Moony and Dumbledore talking about her.

She told him about how they were afraid her magic was getting too out of control, and that they were planning to do something with her to try and control her. And how she was pretty sure that it had something to do with Harry. She even had to tell him about nearly destroying his precious Quidditch equipment the previous morning, because he had to know what happened to freak out two of the calmest people they knew so much.

She also showed him the strange letter she found at the Dursley's from Dumbledore. Harry didn't have any clue what was going on with that either. But she thought it just might have something to do with the reason Dumbledore left him with the Dursleys in the first place rather then with Sirius and Remus.

The only problem with that theory was they didn't have the faintest idea what Dumbledore's reason for doing that was.

"So what're we gonna do about this?" Harry asked with a determined glint in his emerald green eyes.

"We're going to return the spying favour" Lyra said simply, "They said they were going to talk to Min and dad sometime today so we've just got to use your cloak to find out when and where, they think we're just playing exploding snap or something like that. Moony's probably talking to dad right now"

They scrambled up from sitting on the bed and Harry threw the invisibility cloak over them both, it was big enough to cover the two of them easily.

They sneaked out of Harry's room quietly and tiptoed down the stairs trying to listen out for any sort of sound that would tell them where Sirius and Remus were. They checked all around downstairs and there was no sign of their guardians whatsoever.

"Let's go back upstairs" Lyra whispered to Harry. Even though there was no one around the house elves somehow hear _everything_ and they didn't want the little creatures knowing they were up to something.

"Why?" Harry whispered back confused

"Well where do they go where they think we'd never be stupid enough to go?" Lyra asked and comprehension dawned in Harry's eyes.

Together they crept back up the stairs and trying not to make a single sound made their way over to a door at the end of the hall.

The door to Sirius Black's bedroom.

It was left open, just enough for Lyra to fit through without being noticed and there was a silencing charm around the room so they couldn't hear from outside. Lyra shot a look at Harry and he nodded slipping as quietly as he could from under the invisibility cloak. Once sure she was completely covered Lyra sucked in a breath and slipped through the opened door trying not to move too much in case she moved the door.

When inside she skulked away from the door and hid on the other side of the dressing table. It was only then that the men started talking again. It seemed to her that her dad was stunned into silence before this, which was something that happened about as often as a blue moon.

"Are you serious?" he asked Lyra's uncle, who was now pacing back and forth while her dad sat on the bed in front of him.

"No, you're Sirius" Remus shot back the bad, overused pun out of an old habit that the two kids had started to pick up on too

Next thing Lyra new her dad had some sort of seizure-looking thing and shouted at Remus, obviously starting to freak out, "MOONY THIS IS NOT THE TIME FOR THAT!"

"Fine, I'm serious. And we have to do something quickly, but Dumbledore won't do anything unless you and Minerva agree to this"

"But she's only ten Moony" Sirius said dejectedly, "She's my daughter, what am I supposed to do? It can't be that bad can it?"

"She's already got an unusual access to her powers, but no training at all so she doesn't know what she's doing, and she just _had_ to get your temper, which makes things even worse because when she gets any way angry it just gets completely insane and there's no way for anyone to stop it, even her"

"And this is the only way to help her?"

"Yes, if we don't do something _right now_ then she'll end up hurting herself seriously, or hurt someone she's close to and we both know what that would do to her Sirius" Remus explained as Lyra bit her lip listening and trying not to make a sound as the conversation seemingly came to an end.

Remus had now stopped pacing up and down the room and stood facing Sirius with a worried expression.

Sirius was looking up at Remus wearing a reluctant but slightly defeated look.

Knowing she might have only a few seconds to escape from the room and for her and Harry to get away unnoticed once the two men finished talking Lyra started creeping back towards the door as silently as she possibly could.

"Alright Remus. I guess we don't have much of a choice do we?"

"We'll have to talk to Minerva and then try and convince Dumbledore"

"Why is he being so difficult about this? He surely knows as well as the rest of us what's best for her"

"He thinks she's too young, he would probably wait until she was seventeen or eighteen to tell her if he had his way, even though he knows that would be far too late, she would be totally lost by then"

Sirius stood up when Remus finished talking and Lyra's eyes popped open, she just remembered she was meant to be escaping right then.

She spun around and slipped through the door quickly and tiptoed over to where Harry was standing by the door and threw the cloak over him just in time because the second after they were both covered again Sirius and Remus practically stormed out the door and went off down the corridor.

As soon as they were out of earshot and going down the stairs Lyra let out a sigh or relief and let her shoulders slump after being so tense while doing the eavesdropping. It was something that was always really nerve-wracking when involving the original marauders or Mad-Eye Moody. There was a 90% chance you would get caught in the act and a 100% chance they wouldn't be happy about it when they did catch you.

They quickly went back into Harry's room and pulled off the cloak, Lyra recounting the conversation as soon as they were uncovered.

She was starting to get incredibly frustrated because she still had no idea what was going on or what the hell was actually wrong with her. All she did know was that Dumbledore was the one who knew the most about whatever it was, and that he didn't want to tell her until she was of age apparently, but Remus was against that, and had convinced her dad to be too, now they were working on her Aunt Min.

She thought all this was incredibly unfair; it was her they were talking about after all! She deserved to know what was going on.

"We've really got to stop just listening in on the bare end of conversations" Harry commented casually, "It's making things more confusing mostly, and it's not really helping at all"

"I know, we seriously need to get better at this sneaking around business or we'll never survive Hogwarts – well when I get there _eventually_"

"Don't worry, we just need more practise"

Lyra sighed and levitated Harry's new chessmen, who then started to protest about being taken from their box like that. Lyra ignored their complaints and made them move in an intricate pattern in the air, moving so she was lying on her stomach with her chin resting in her hands.

"Ly?" Harry asked and Lyra started, having zoned out watching the moving chess pieces, jumped and accidentally let the chessmen go. They fell to the ground giving out to her and yelling obscenities, a good lot of which Lyra didn't understand in the slightest.

"Sorry" she said to the angry pieces and sent them back to their box before they could give out to her anymore. Even with the wooden container closed she could still hear one of the knights yelling at her, but its voice was muffled and she couldn't make out any of the words.

"Were you talking to me Harry?"

"Yes, but you were a bit preoccupied" he said dryly, "I was saying while you were ignoring me, your instincts normally pretty good, what are they telling you about all this?"

Harry really was the smart one of the two. Lyra hadn't even thought of that. He was right though, what her aunts called her 'women's intuition' was in fact incurably accurate with almost everything, especially with people. She was often told that she must have some sort of seer abilities because of how often she was right.

One example is that when she was only seven she told Kinglsey and her dad that one of the Aurors was a 'bad man' but they didn't believe her. About a month later it was discovered that he was the murder they were after and had been throwing them in the wrong direction for months.

She was very like her aunt in the way she didn't have much time for divination because it was so imprecise so she, of course, dismissed any and all claims that se was gifted with the 'inner eye'.

Lyra nearly slapped herself when Harry asked her that. She had been over thinking things way too much. She shoved her thoughts aside and took a deep breath and listened to the sound of her heart beating in its strong, steady rhythm. She came up with only one option and the twinge she felt in her heart and the slight falter in its rhythm caused her to bite her lip anxiously.

"It's got something to do with the accident" she said to Harry and his eyes widened, shocked.

"Are you sure?" he asked.

Lyra shook her head, "No…I don't know…maybe"

All Lyra and Harry knew about the 'accident' was that when Lyra was three years old a rogue demon burst into the house where Lyra and her mother, Arra McGonagall, were waiting for her Aunt Min to come back from work at Hogwarts to visit with them.

They had been waiting in the old cottage where Minerva used to live with her late husband and still owned. They hadn't wanted to take Lyra to the castle because the students were a _bit_ of a bad influence on her whenever they did. The demon somehow got into the house and went straight for Lyra, totally ignoring her mother's presence. That is until she attacked it, trying to stop it hurting her daughter. Arra was a powerful and talented witch, particularly with duelling, but this was a very high level, powerful and totally out of control demon.

It killed her and was about to go after Lyra again when Minerva arrived home, Dumbledore having come back with her as well.

The demon had managed to seriously injure Lyra before they got there, but she accidentally blew up a glass vase that had hurt the demon too. That had, luckily for Lyra, slowed it down momentarily.

Whatever happened between when the two teachers got there and Dumbledore took care of the creature Lyra couldn't remember, even though she could remember everything else that had happened before that in vivid detail. After when the demon looked away from her on hearing her aunt and Dumbledore arrive was a complete black spot in her memory.

Whatever it was it wasn't good. And Lyra had always had the horrible feeling that the attack wasn't an accident, as she'd been told ever since that day.

"What d'you mean?"

"I don't know, but I think it's to do with that day" she said and started pulling at her sleeves self-consciously and frowning at her arms.

She basically never wore short sleeves because she still had the scars from that day. There were marks from the slashes of the demon's claws on her right arm, across her chest, and a few smaller ones on her stomach. There was one that began at the back of her neck and ran down along her back until it reached her waist, too.

They hadn't faded much with time and were easily seen and identifiable as the marks of a demon to anyone with proper knowledge of dark creatures.

"So what d'you wanna do?" Harry asked

Lyra thought hard for a moment.

"We're gonna wait till tomorrow to do anything, the way Moony was talking I've got the feeling he wants to just come out with it, so we'll know pretty soon what they're planning if him and dad get their way, which they almost always do. If they don't tell us anything by tomorrow night we'll have a bit of a snoop around Dumbledore's office"

Harry nodded, he seemed like he wanted to do something right then, maybe try to follow Sirius and Remus to Min's to spy some more.

The only reason he wasn't arguing about sitting around doing nothing was that this was about Lyra and he thought she should make the decision because this was a very sensitive topic for her and he knew she couldn't stand hearing too much about it all at once.

"Alright" he said sounding reluctant, which confirmed Lyra's thought that he didn't really agree with her, but was being his considerate self and letting her do what she felt was best this time.

oOoOoOoOoOo

The next day the sun was high in the sky and beating down on Potter Manor harshly.

Harry and Sirius were outside flying and practicing Quidditch in the full sized Quidditch pitch that was at the far side of the manor's grounds.

Sirius was a beater on the Gryffindor team when he was at Hogwarts and so had decided to train Harry in the sport when he showed a 'bloody amazing' natural talent at flying since he was very young. He had being encouraging Harry as of late to try out for the Gryffindor team even though he knew no fist year ever made the team. According to him the team was so awful lately they'd be desperate enough for a good player to pick a first year.

He was just as disappointed as Minerva when they were apparently flattened by Slytherin in the last match the previous year.

Lyra, who on the other hand hated flying, much to her father's disapproval, was bored out of her mind with nothing to do. She didn't even have someone to plan any pranks with.

What made things even worse was that Moony had gone away on "Hogwarts business" as he'd said. She didn't know what that meant but she hoped he'd tell her about the conversations she overheard by tonight so she wouldn't have to try and snoop around more.

It was an exceedingly difficult task to get information out of a marauder when they didn't want to give it to you.

She sighed lethargically and rested her chin in her hand. Just as she was about to go try and turn Harry's chessmen against him again – he was winning far too often with them – she heard a clatter of things falling and someone's muffled voice cursing.

A bright smile lit up her face and she ran towards the source of the noise.

Once she reached the sitting room her eyes fell upon what looked like a tangle of cushions, a table, a lamp and a person. She burst out laughing.

"Heya Tonks!" she called to the tangled mass, "How'd you manage that?"

"I have no idea" a female voice groaned from the mass of fallen objects and a few seconds later a girl of about seventeen climbed from the probably broken furniture.

She glanced back at the mess she'd made and pulled out her wand and with a flick of her wrist everything was back where it was supposed to be and no longer broken.

"Wotcher Pup" she said with a wink.

This girl was quite tall, with a pale, heart shaped face. What was more unusual about her was that she had bubblegum pink hair and bright, practically luminous, orange coloured eyes. This wasn't her natural appearance, but she had the ability to change her appearance at will and the bubblegum pink was a favourite hair colour of hers. She was also wearing a purple t-shirt with 'The Weird Sisters' wrote on it in white chunky writing, and old faded and ripped jeans and clunky boots.

She was Nymphadora Tonks, Lyra's favourite cousin.

She preferred to just go by Tonks because she loathed her first name. Tonks had a tendency to be incredibly clumsy, picking the worst moments to trip or knock something over. While it was incredibly funny most of the time, sometimes it was a huge disadvantage, mostly during the times when she was sleuthing around.

"What're you doing here? You weren't supposed to get back from France till next week" Lyra asked

"We came home early; mum found out about the frogs legs fiasco I told you about" Tonks told her younger cousin chuckling, "She _wasn't_ very happy with me to say the least"

"Let me guess, your ear drums are still recovering?"

"Eh, they'll be fine" she shrugged then grinned easily, "Now let's liven things up a bit round here"

Remus had told Lyra he'd be home for around four o'clock and Harry and Sirius wouldn't be done for another while after that.

That made it a pretty easy decision to pick their newest target.

So Lyra and Tonks spent the half hour they'd have before Remus arrived home setting up a welcome back prank for him in the sitting room and trying to find a camera so they could snap a picture of his face after he was so unexpectedly assaulted.

When the time finally came for Remus to come home the two girls crouched out of sight behind the couch opposite the fireplace waiting to set things off when Remus appeared in the fireplace. Peeking around the edges they saw, not a minute later, the tell tale emerald green flames erupt in the fireplace and a figure appear amongst them. The cousins grinned at each other and Tonks flicked her wand at a rope and Lyra waved her hand at some sort of miniature cannon.

The cannon went off with a loud blast and triggered the many others planted around the room to do the same. With more noise then a heard of stampeding elephants they all fired their ammunition and kept going like machine guns firing a continuous stream of balls the size of golf balls filled with paint, all directed towards the fire.

The rope was severed when Tonks waved her wand at it and it released open bags of feathers that were rigged up to the ceiling and caused them to be hurled at and thrown all over the person that was already being pelted with paintballs.

The chaos stilled after a moment and not a second later Lyra and Tonks leapt up from their hiding place victoriously. The elder of the two snapped a shot with the camera they found before anyone else in the room could've had time to move. They were about to rub it in Remus' face that they'd gotten him when they stopped dead and stared wide eyed at what they'd done.

You see, it wasn't just Remus that had come through the floo network.

Lyra's uncle, her Aunt Min, Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape were all standing by the hearth, paint splattered all over them and feathers stuck to them randomly.

One of the four looked merely amused, one looked positively murderous, another looked irritated and slightly amused, though they were trying to hide it, the last looked extremely pissed off, with their lips pressed into a thin, disapproving line.

Lyra and Tonks snapped out of their staring pretty quickly and promptly ran from the room like they were being chased by a dozen angry centaurs. They didn't stop until they reached Lyra's bedroom and slammed the door shut behind them. Once it was shut Tonks whipped out her wand again and started muttering to herself, casting locking and protection charms all over it.

This was a necessary precaution, a mere locked door wouldn't hold a Hogwarts teacher up for more then a second or two and was actually completely useless when in the company of wizards, as Lyra found out as soon as her cousins started learning magic and just barged into her room after using a quick Alohomora on the door.

"You know you're just putting off Greasy skinning us alive right?" Lyra clarified as she watched her cousin finish putting up the protection charms.

Tonks nodded but there was a smile on her lips

"Yeah, but Dumbledore'll stop him a lot longer. And by the time he finally storms off after us Sirius'll be back in from Quidditch with Harry, and if he thinks Big-nose is gonna touch a hair on your head it'll be him getting skinned. And even if he goes after us before that happens, he still has to find us"

"Good point" Lyra allowed not having thought of that herself. "You'll make a good Auror when you finally get through the N.E."

"Don't remind me, they've already given us tonnes of homework, and the year hasn't even started yet!" she complained, "Be glad the only pressure you've got on you is to keep that temper of yours under control"

"Ha, ha" Lyra said sarcastically giving her cousin a hard glare.

It was then they heard someone banging on the other side of the door. They both jumped away from it and Tonks pointed her wand at the door threateningly even though the person on the other side couldn't see her.

"Come on Pup, you're not in trouble" Sirius pleaded from outside, "We just want to talk to you!"

Lyra and Tonks shared a look; both wondering if this was a trap of some sort. You could never know when it came to him.

During the few seconds they were trying to discern weather or not he was trying to trick them Sirius had taken down all of their protective enchantments. The door swung open gently, but dramatically, and the girls were met with the sight of him standing in front of them with his arms crossed and the most smug expression you could imagine plastered across his face. He didn't say anything though, just looked at Lyra with a knowing look and raised an eyebrow at her. She groaned and her shoulders slumped in defeat.

Sirius turned and started to walk away. Lyra followed him but Tonks stayed where she was. She knew better then to try and spy on Sirius, Remus, Minerva and Dumbledore all at once. No one would get away with it.

It was very reluctantly that Lyra caught up with her father and walked by his side back towards the sitting room.

Sirius was the first of the two to break the heavy silence that was hanging around them.

"Snivellus is fit to kill someone" he commented and looked down at Lyra with an extremely childish grin lighting up his face, "I know I'm supposed to be the mature parent here, but I'm so proud of you!" he exclaimed and hugged her to his side with one arm. Lyra laughed

"It was an accident, we meant to get Moony but then they all showed up and it was just _mad_" she confessed

"That's even better. Now he can't say anything cause none of it was actually meant for him and he still got the brunt of it"

Lyra shook her head at her father. He really never was going to get over whatever happened between him and Snape that started their mutual loathing. She never understood why they bothered to keep it up after all these years; she would've gotten sick of holding a grudge by now.

"What's so important that you want to talk to _me_ about?" she asked as they started descending the grand staircase, her burning curiosity finally getting the better of her.

Her dad just laughed.

"Have some patience Pup, you'll find out in a minute"

"That's the pot calling the kettle black" Lyra grumbled to herself using an expression her aunt Min used sometimes as a slightly nicer way of calling someone a hypocrite.

But she spoke loud enough for her dad to hear her and he let out an indignant "Hey!"

When they finally made it back into the sitting room after what felt to Lyra like an age, the tension in the room couldn't even be cut by a chainsaw. The teachers were no longer covered in paint and feathers but they were all wearing similar expressions as to those Lyra had last seen them with.

Snape was still furious. It wasn't an obvious sort of fury, in fact most of his face was a perfectly calm, indifferent mask, but it was his eyes that gave him away. The dark, almost black, irises showed a roaring fire of pure white-hot loathing that longed to burn her alive.

Amusement and annoyance were warring to be the most prominent expression on Remus' face. When he laid eyes on her Lyra thought that amusement was currently winning, but it could still go either way, the werewolf could be very unpredictable at times.

Minerva just looked plain exasperated and tired. She shook her head sadly almost as if admitting defeat. If Lyra didn't know her aunt so well she would have mistaken the gesture as such. She looked at Lyra and her expression very plainly asked simply "why?". She was no doubt thinking with dread over the day Lyra would join Harry at Hogwarts next year.

Dumbledore still looked highly amused and altogether unbothered by the prank-gone-wrong, as he always annoyingly was. Something about the way he was holding himself made Lyra think he wasn't as unaffected as he seemed to be trying to come across. For one, he wasn't standing as casually. Another thing was that he wasn't stroking his beard as he usually did when he was observing her or Harry.

Something was bothering the headmaster, and Lyra would bet her piano that it was whatever they'd come here for.

"Sit down Pup, we've got a lot to talk about" Sirius told her and motioned for her to sit down on the comfortable crimson couch and he followed suit, sitting next to her with a slightly uneasy look in his steely grey eyes.

The look unnerved her; Lyra was used to her dad looking calm and collected in every situation. So she braced herself for what she was sure was going to be bad news.


	4. Hogwarts, A Nightmare

**Lyra Black and the Philosopher's Stone**

**A/N** - Hello again! I hope you enjoy the next chapter, with thanks to my beta hpfan224. I'd also like to thank all of you who've read this far, and everyone who reviewed.

**Chapter 4 – Hogwarts, A Nightmare**

Lyra looked around at the adults surrounding her with unease weighing down her limbs and her stomach clenching horribly. Normally no matter who she was in the room with Lyra never felt threatened, intimidated or at all like normal children usually would when surrounded by very important people. Then again, Lyra was never one to be a "normal" child.

But at the moment she did feel very out of place.

Anyone would really. She was surrounded by some of the most talented witches and wizards of the time. Lyra did meet them on a regular basis, but this time they were literally surrounding her and they wouldn't look away from her.

That made her feel closed in, like she was being caged in by them. She didn't like that feeling at all.

She started to feel very uncomfortable, and the glare Snape was boring into the side of her face wasn't helping. Neither were the unfathomable looks she was receiving from Dumbledore over the top of his half-moon glasses.

All these feelings were intensified by the fact they had a look about them that taunted her saying 'we know something you don't' and she knew this to be true. Why else would they have called her here?

But being herself Lyra was determined not to show any sign of her severe discomfort and regaining the defiant, roguish glint in her silver eyes was the one to break the heavy silence.

"So, what did you drag me down here for?" she asked bluntly as always quirking an eyebrow at the faintly nervous glances that were exchanged between her father, uncle and aunt. "Well?" she prompted.

Remus sighed and walked over to sit on her other side. He regarded her carefully as if she was made of glass.

She scowled at that, Lyra hated being treated like she was so breakable; she always had and always will. She was made of tougher stuff then they gave her credit for most of the time.

"You know you're an incredibly powerful witch" he started and Lyra frowned and tilted her head to the side wearing an expression of innocent curiosity.

"Really?" she asked disbelievingly. She heard Snape scoff and saw him roll his eyes disdainfully out of the corner of her eye.

"Yes, you are. Most people your age have no control over their magic whatsoever, and don't use it at will or on a regular basis" Sirius told her with a definite undertone of pride in his voice.

"Because of this we decided that it would be best for you if you started Hogwarts this year rather then next" Remus said and Lyra's jaw nearly hit the floor.

Was he serious?

He couldn't possibly be serious?

Could what she'd been hoping for since she was old enough to use magic be actually happening?

"You're joking" Lyra said staring at her uncle with eyes the size of a house elf's.

She turned her dinner-plate like gaze to her father and saw him smiling at her like he was trying to contain a chuckle. Her aunt was smiling at her, all annoyance over her earlier prank wiped from her face instantly.

"No Lyra, we're not" Min assured her

"But I thought there was a law against going to a magical school if you were under eleven" she said with disbelief clear in her voice and across her face.

The adults looked surprised she knew about that law, it wasn't all that well known anymore. Waiting until eleven to go to school was just what was done in the wizarding world now.

The only reason Lyra knew about it was because she had gone looking through the massive, incredibly boring for the most part – though there were a few laws and things of the sort that actually made her laugh loudly enough for a house elf to think she was being attacked – law books to try and find something she could use to stop them keeping her behind when Harry went off to school.

Also she did get awfully bored when Sirius and Harry went on their "useless Quidditch rampages", as Lyra liked to call them, and Remus was at school.

To her great disappointment she had found the law that stated it was illegal for any witch or wizard to start magical training unless they reached the age of eleven before the 3rd of August.

That law book was no longer in the Potter library sadly.

Lyra was so annoyed that it exploded into a burning mass of scraps of leather and parchment and was found later by a house elf in an undistinguishable mess of charred material.

"The minister has agreed to make an exception, but it should not become public knowledge that you are attending under the lawful age" Dumbledore explained and Lyra nodded her head uncertainly.

"Why?" she asked.

Yes her dad and Dumbledore had a lot of influence in the ministry, but certainly not enough for the minister to allow them to blatantly break the law like that. As soon as the word left her lips though, Lyra knew she wasn't going to get an answer.

"That is something we will tell you when the time is right" the headmaster said and Lyra felt she should've known better then to ask.

"If that's all you had to tell me then why did all of you bother coming? Why couldn't you just let dad and Moony tell me?" she asked.

"Because that's not all we wanted to tell you" Sirius answered her and she sent him a questioning look. "Depending on how you get on during the first month or so you'll start having extra lessons with Min and Snape"

Her dad didn't seem all too happy about that and Lyra couldn't blame him. She was in the same boat.

Why did it have to be Snape? He hated her for reasons she didn't think she'd ever know. She hadn't even done anything bad enough to him to deserve his hatred – on purpose anyway, it wasn't her fault if he got in the way more often then he should've.

But Lyra would happily take a thousands lessons with Snape if it meant she could go to Hogwarts with Harry.

She was going to Hogwarts with Harry!

After that she was allowed to leave and Lyra pretty much ran from the room.

It was when she reached Harry's room that she got over the surprise and the news actually hit her. Excitement flooded through her and a childish grin spread across her face and she raised her fist to start banging impatiently on Harry's door.

It was flung open a moment later by a bemused looking Harry,

"Ly, what's going on?" he asked cautiously after seeing the expression on the younger child's face. Lyra didn't answer him right away and just barrelled past him and into the large, spacious room without saying anything.

She whirled back around to face Harry and the door swung shut seemingly of its own accord. Lyra still had that crazy grin stretched across her small diamond shaped face.

"Are you alright?" Harry asked looking at her cautiously

"No, I'm bloody brilliant!" she yelled back at him and flopped down on his bed, her smile still firmly in place

"Why? Didn't Padfoot just bring you to Moony for him to give out to you about the prank you and Tonks tried to pull?" Harry asked puzzled

"No, but you'll never believe what just happened!"

Harry Potter wasn't someone you could scare easily, but Lyra could rattle up even his nerves of steel when she put her mind to it.

Harry also knew that when Lyra was this excited about something it normally wasn't good for anyone other then the small mischievous girl. Because of that Harry was very wary of asking what happened, though he knew Lyra would tell him anyway. He really wasn't sure if he wanted to know, thinking it was something terrible.

He was so shocked that he did a double take and his jaw hit the floor with a loud thump at the words that came out of Lyra's smirking mouth next.

"I'm going to Hogwarts!" she yelled getting up to start bouncing on his bed like it was a trampoline.

"What?" Harry asked after recovering from his state of astonishment

"I'm going to Hogwarts with you" Lyra said again.

She jumped off the bed and landed gracefully in front of her brother her eyes twinkling brightly.

"How?" he asked the shock on his face being replaced with delight as he realised she wasn't joking and this wasn't just her stubbornness refusing to give up on going to school with Harry.

"I don't know, but I am. They wouldn't tell me the full story but I know that it's cause of my freakishness at least"

"But I thought it was illegal" Harry said, his smile faltering

"So did I, apparently the minister made an exception. Why I don't have a bloody clue"

"That's really weird" Harry commented looking suspicious

"Yeah, but who cares we can figure that mess out later. We're going to Hogwarts together!" Lyra reminded him and realisation dawned in Harry's eyes and a grin identical to Lyra's spread over his face

"They won't know what hit them" Harry said in a way that would cause a shiver of fear and unease to ripple through most. Lyra just smirked back as he slung an arm around her shoulder. "What should we do first?"

"Well I say we need to break dad and Moony's record they set in their second week" she suggested and Harry fixed his glasses that were starting to slide down his nose from looking down at Lyra while she was talking.

"We'll need to start planning right now then" he commented and went over to his chest of drawers to pull out a bunch of parchment covered in what looked like blueprints and elaborate plans. "Which one d'you wanna use first?"

Lyra paused for a moment to think.

She snapped her fingers and cheerfully said "Sludge" which made no sense whatsoever really, but Harry seemed to know what she meant and pulled out a sheet of parchment that was covered in drawings and hastily scribbled words.

Sirius and Remus didn't know about this secret stash of plans. They thought that Harry and Lyra were still on the level of simple pranks like the paintball one Lyra and Tonks used earlier that day.

They, sadly for the rest of the world, were not.

When the two were bored and it was too soon after their last stunt to do something else around the house they sat around Harry's room and made plans for all the pranks they'd pull when they were both at Hogwarts. Harry's and Lyra's drawers were full of these plans and they used the library to figure out how to actually do them, that was what most of the scribbles were about, all the spells and materials they'd need for that certain prank.

Sometimes when they couldn't find what they needed in the Potter library they sneaked into Black Manor when Sirius and Remus were asleep and grabbed a few books from there.

The two had thought they would have another year to plan and get a hold of the things they'd need since Lyra wasn't meant to be going to Hogwarts until next year. But now that was all changed and they were in for a summer of sneaking around to get stuff without either of the adults noticing and last minute fixing of their shenanigans.

Some of the stunts they had only just started planning would've put their father's first year selves to shame.

The duo sat on Harry's bed with the sheets of parchment scattered around them and a stack of thick heavy books was dragged out from under the bed and laid next to them. They got to work enthusiastically, laughing and delighting in the chaos they were sure to bring upon the castle from the second they set foot inside the door of the grand building.

The castle was lucky it survived the first generation of Marauders. It may not be so blessed the second time around.

They didn't go to bed until Sirius came up and dragged Lyra back to her room saying it was way too late for them to be up and he'd never be able to get them up in the morning. Still, ten minutes after that Lyra was back in Harry's room eating chocolate frogs and making up plans for destruction by candle light.

_Nothing_ can get in the way of a marauder and their pranks, not even another marauder.

The two of them stayed up into the early hours of the morning remaining undiscovered by either of their guardians. It's very likely that they knew but thought the two kids would get tired long before they actually did.

It was around half three in the morning when Lyra sneaked back into her room, completely exhausted. She was so tired that she walked – more like slumped her way really – straight over to her massive bed and fell asleep as soon as her head hit one of her many pillows.

Even though she was so sleepy that she couldn't keep her eyes open as she walked into her room Lyra didn't sleep peacefully that night – well that morning. She tossed and turned violently and had the strangest dreams, even by her definition of strange they were freaky.

As she slipped into unconsciousness she started to fall into an old memory, one she always hated revisiting.

At least she thought it was an old memory at first. She could never really tell if it was or not.

She was standing in the middle of a room that was dark as a sealed tomb. She was all alone, as far as she could see anyway. Which was only about a foot in front of her. It was freezing cold and she could see her breath rising from her like smoke. Her body shuddered fiercely and her teeth chattered.

Out of the darkness a voice called to her.

Lyra couldn't make out what it was saying; it was in a language that she couldn't understand.

Even not knowing what the voice was saying she knew it wasn't anything good. The voice sounded cold, cruel and malicious. It had an odd affect on her, like it sucked out every good thing around her, everything good inside of her was taken away too.

All that was left was anger and darkness.

There was no light anymore.

She felt something welling up, not insider her, but from somewhere in the room she couldn't tell the size of. She could feel it getting stronger, and closer to her. Whatever it was, it was powerful, and angry for some reason.

It was the thing that was speaking to her she knew instinctively.

Then, very suddenly, she wasn't in the dark room anymore.

Her new surroundings weren't much more comforting.

She was in some kind of temple from the looks of it. It was old and decrepit and covered in dust so thick it was like a blanket covering every surface. Dust wasn't the only thing covering nearly everything. There was some weird flaky paint smeared on the walls and ornaments in odd places.

Nearly every crevice of the altar was coated in it.

She walked up to the altar slowly, transfixed by the strange carvings on the stone. They were horrifically gruesome and unearthly beautiful. She reached out and touched the warm stained stone. Her hand fell upon the carving of an inhuman face that seemed to be the centre of the design.

As Lyra traced the dips and curves of the image she felt something drip onto her hand. She found crimson dots appearing on her hand.

When she peered back at the massive stone structure she saw that the paint had gone from a dry peeling mess to flowing and gushing everywhere. It was flowing down the sides of the altar like a waterfall. It was only when she looked around at the rest of the room that was in the same state she realised that it wasn't paint smeared all over the room.

It was blood.

The warm crimson liquid was pooling up to her ankles by now and she was frozen in horror. She felt a tug on her hand and her head snapped back to the face on the altar.

It was moving.

The lips were mouthing something at her that she couldn't understand. She felt like it was trying to pull her in.

She jerked her hand away from the terrifying face and stumbled away from the altar.

The second her hand separated from the stone a blood curdling scream was heard, then another, and another, and another. They kept going and getting louder and louder. The face started screaming now too, only it remained mute.

It looked like it was yelling at her.

She kept stumbling backwards as the blood climbed higher up her body and the walls of the chamber. She had to get out of there or she'd drown.

As she tried to find and exit she felt something grab her ankle and trip her. She was now submerged in the uncomfortably warm blood and could feel the hand pull her back. Another hand joined it on her upper calf.

She clawed at the ground but it didn't help.

She was going to die, that thing was going to kill her. It brought her here to kill her and take her to where the others were screaming from. It was going to add her blood to the walls as a sacrifice of something.

It was going to kill her.

It wanted her dead so badly _she_ could feel its desire pounding through the blood drowning her.

She made the mistake of trying to yell out and blood flowed into her mouth and down her throat and into her lungs. She choked and tried to spit it back out but it was no use. She could feel her life slipping away.

Lyra woke with a start. The first thing she saw was a face less then a foot above hers and she started screaming and thrashing and trying to get away from it. Whatever it was grabbed her to hold her still.

She yelled out at it.

"Let me go! Don't kill me! Let me go!"

"Lyra, Pup, calm down. Please. Please calm down" she heard a familiar voice beg, "It's me, it's dad. You're okay. You're safe"

The words slowly registered in her mind and Lyra stopped trying to claw at the hands holding her down and kick at the body attached to them.

She took in a deep breath and looked up into the eyes of her father. They were filled with intense worry and deep confusion.

It was then she noticed that her throat hurt and her face was wet with tears. She took a quick look around. Her bed was destroyed, more so then normal.

The mattress had holes ripped into it and the headboard had chunks missing from it. The curtains were ripped from their hangings. The sheets were ripped and slashed and had spatters of blood on them.

"D-dad?" she asked her voice shaking as she tried to adjust to her surroundings.

"Yeah, Pup, it's me" he said and lifted her up into his lap. Lyra clung to his shoulders and shook, not from tears, she'd apparently cried enough already, but from total shock. She had no idea what just happened.

After about ten minutes of silence Sirius spoke again, "What happened Pup?" he asked as he stroked her hair.

"I don't know" she answered honestly, "I had a nightmare. I think"

"Okay, well, just go downstairs. Harry and Moony are in the kitchen. I'll be down when I've cleaned up this mess"

Lyra nodded and slipped off the bed and padded out of the room looking a lot paler then normal.

She felt light headed and dizzy, like she'd been hit over the head, or lost a lot of blood. But that couldn't have happened.

Right?

When Harry and Remus heard someone enter the kitchen both of their heads whipped around to the door so fast they were in danger of getting whiplash. Seeing that it was Lyra Remus rushed over to her and grabbed her into a bone crushingly tight hug.

"Uncle Moony, I can't breathe" she told him. Her voice sounded a lot smaller and childlike then it normally did.

"Sorry" he apologised and loosened his hold on her, "You're alright aren't you?" he asked looking over her anxiously.

"Yeah, why wouldn't I be?" she asked curiously.

"No reason, just worried is all. Is Padfoot still up in your room?"

"Yeah he –" Remus was gone from the room before Lyra could say anything else. Though she knew all the fuss wasn't for nothing she was far too tired and sick feeling to try and figure it out at the minute.

Harry would probably already have found out for her anyway.

She took a seat at the table and set her head down on the cool wood, it felt great against her skin which she now realised was very hot. She turned her head to face Harry.

"So what the bloody hell happened?" she asked with a yawn

"I don't know everything; all I know is that I woke up because I heard you screaming loudly enough to hear through the house's soundproofing. I ran out into the hall and tried to get your door open but it was locked. I started yelling to try and wake you up and I guess we woke up Moony and Padfoot.

"They came running down in their pyjamas and Padfoot barged through the door yanking out his wand like he was going into a war zone. Moony took me down here and told me not to even try and go back up to your room until Padfoot said it was okay"

"Weird" Lyra said wanting to go back to sleep but as soon as she thought of the dreams – more like nightmares – she stopped herself.

She definitely wasn't up for whatever that was happening again any time soon.

"Yeah" Harry agreed, "Are you sure you're alright?"

"I don't have a clue. I don't know any more then you do. Less even. I just thought I was having a nightmare and then I woke up and my bed was destroyed and my sheets were ripped and covered in blood"

"You think they'll tell us?" Harry suggested

"I don't think I want to know" Lyra said with a shudder for what must have been one of the first time in her life.

Harry looked surprised first, but hid it behind a mask of calm when he saw how Lyra was hurting.


	5. Diagon Alley

**Lyra Black and the Philospher's Stone**

**A/N** - Hello again everyone. I'd like to give the usual thanks to my beta, hpfan224. Thanks to everyone who's read this far, and to everyone who reviewed. Enjoy the next chapter ;)

**Chapter 5 - Diagon Alley**

A week of hard work later Lyra and Harry had finished off all their uncompleted schemes and were very proud of themselves. All they needed to do now was figure out how to get all of their plans and books into Hogwarts without being caught.

This was proving to be quite difficult though. They knew that Min looked over the trunks to make sure no one was bringing anything against the rules with them to the castle, and it was proving very hard to think of a way to get around her.

That week later had also seen the incident seemingly forgotten about in Potter manor. It wasn't though.

Everyone still thought about it more now than ever, they just never broached the subject because they were afraid of something, but Lyra didn't know what. She kind of got the feeling that Harry was holding something back from her, and she knew her father and uncle weren't telling her anything about it really, but she tried to get over it.

Some things were better off left forgotten.

Lyra couldn't do any more on hers and Harry's pranks today because today was the day her father and uncle were taking her and Harry to Diagon Alley.

Lyra had been there only a few times before, not having much reason to go all the way to London. But when she had been there she had loved every minute of it, well every minute of it except going to her family vault in Gringots. The goblins were just plain creepy, and they gave her the weirdest looks when she was there.

Since visiting London when she was younger Lyra's always wanted to live in the city, it was so much more interesting then living in the middle of nowhere.

Lyra being her usual self, forgot about this trip completely after she fell asleep the night before. So when Sirius went into her room to wake her up in the morning things didn't go quite as he'd planned.

He swung open his daughter's door at seven in the morning and loped quietly into the room with a smile on his face. The first thing he did was throw open the curtains so he could see.

This didn't wake Lyra up for only one reason.

She had a four-poster bed with thick violet hangings that blocked out all the light even with the curtains on the windows open and the bright morning light glaring into the room.

Sirius grinned to himself thinking of how much he loved waking his daughter up in the morning. It was always a laugh because she, so unlike him, was probably the worst morning person the world has ever seen.

She was like death on a stick until lunch time most days, so she normally slept in and stayed up very late as a result, though Remus and Sirius didn't know about this and thought she went to bed when they told her to.

The 'adult' skipped - yes, that's right, skipped - silently over to Lyra's bed and threw open the hangings.

The second the light hit her eyes Lyra let out a yell/groan sound of discontent and buried herself deep under the blanket cocoon she had made herself during the night. This didn't dampen Sirius' mood one bit, he knew for a fact that this was only the beginning.

"Come on Pup, it's time to get up" Sirius sang at his daughter and all he got in response was a grunt that sounded a lot like 'shag off'

"Hey, watch your language" he scolded her.

Another muffled retort came from under the blankets that Sirius thought sounded like 'you're one to talk' and another word he couldn't make out but guessed was another swear.

He went to pull the blankets off her but Lyra saw that coming and grabbed hold of one of the many, many pillows that were scattered around the bed and threw it at her dad with all the force she could muster. And that was a surprisingly considerable amount of power, especially for first thing in the morning.

The pillow hit Sirius right in the face and knocked him backward and caused him to lose his balance and fall onto his arse. He recovered from this pretty quickly though. He hadn't been expecting it, but he was used to Lyra's unusual strength showing itself at the most random times.

"Don't make me throw ice-water over you Pup" Sirius threatened hoping that would have Lyra shooting out of the bed like a bat out of hell like it normally would have. But today it didn't have the desired effect, mostly because Lyra had stayed up past midnight reading up on magical ways of concealment.

She grumbled something that sounded an awful like 'sod off' again and it looked like she rolled over so her back was facing her father giving him the message that she was done giving him the time of day and that he could kindly fuck off and let her sleep now.

"Alright if that's how you want to play it" Sirius whipped out his wand and pointed it at the mass of blankets and pillows, "Aguamenti" he said and a stream of freezing cold water shot from his wand dousing the bed and its occupant.

Lyra let out a very out of character screech and thrashed around until she was free of the now soaking wet blankets.

She sat up suddenly with a murderous look on her face. The movement sent a wave of power out from her and Sirius felt like he was hit with an invisible wall and was thrown backwards across the room.

Lyra didn't even realise what she'd done until she looked around and saw her dad and a few other things that had been caught by the blast scattered on the floor. She stared wide eyed at her father and said very quietly

"Woops"

"Pup" Sirius said sounding more exasperated than anything else, "Now that you're up, get ready, we're going to Diagon Alley soon"

"Is that today?" Lyra asked

"Yeah" he said standing up with a huff, "So there was no need to throw me around the place"

Lyra laughed awkwardly and her dad left her to get ready to go. When he shut the door Lyra face palmed.

"How could I forget about that?" she asked herself, "I'm such an idiot"

With a sigh she got out of bed and looked wistfully at it. She'd have to get her dad or uncle to dry it out soon. If she tried it she'd probably end up turning it to ash. Though she was now fully awake she was still like the walking dead as she made her way to her bathroom to try and clean herself up a bit.

She managed to get in and out without knocking anything over which was quite an accomplishment since her eyes were more than half shut still and her brain hadn't turned on just yet. She dressed not fully aware of what she was doing but still somehow managed to put on clothes that were nice and didn't clash horribly with each other, and none of them were backwards or inside out.

Her uncle often attributed this skill to Blacks in general. He says that every one of them he's ever met doesn't even look in their closet before getting dressed but every last one of them still end up looking better than if they'd spent two hours getting ready.

She turned to her dresser and groaned.

It was time to try and do her hair.

Being raised by two men didn't leave her with much knowledge about that sort of thing, other then what she'd picked up from her aunts and occasionally her older cousins when they roped her into letting them do her up.

This was made more awkward by the fact that she had incredibly long hair. Her hair wasn't an unmanageable mess or anything, but there was just _so bloody much_ of it.

Deciding that she simply couldn't be bothered to do anything with it she just grabbed the nearest brush and gently worked through the knots in her curls until she looked someway presentable and left it like that.

When she got downstairs she was entranced by the smell of something absolutely heavenly. It was the one and only thing that could wake her from her half comatose, half bitchy state in the mornings.

The smell of the delightful wonder that was pancakes was wafting around the ground floor of the manor and it made her mouth water and her hungry stomach grumble demandingly.

So she ran to the kitchen determined to get some of the divine food before her brother and father had eaten them all.

She burst into the kitchen and instantly spotted a plate of her bounty sitting on the kitchen counter and her dad taking a few off of it while casually talking to her uncle Moony about something she didn't give a shit about at the minute.

In a split second before any of the three men noticed her presence Lyra made a mad dash across the kitchen and grabbed the plate of pancakes and the syrup from right under her dad's hands and sprinted around him, Remus, and the table still without them noticing her.

All they saw was that the pancakes had mysteriously vanished.

She pulled out a chair and sat down happily next to Harry and spread the stolen syrup on the pancakes that didn't really count as being stolen because in her mind they were _hers _from the start.

It was then that they noticed her and the two adults shook their heads at her.

"How do you do that?" Harry asked amazed.

He loved when Lyra did stuff like that because she'd always share her winnings with him just to spite Sirius and Remus by not giving them any.

"I dunno" Lyra said and shrugged.

She never really questioned her abilities as a thief; she didn't really know just how strange her speed and strength were.

"Well we'd better get going" Remus said when they'd finished eating and stood up from his chair stretching.

"Are we driving?" Lyra asked hopefully.

She really hated going by the floo network it always messed her up and she couldn't see straight after it.

"No, we're Apparating" Sirius answered her and Lyra and Harry both cocked their heads to the side curiously.

They had heard of apparition of course and had seen friends of their parental figures and other relatives appear out of nowhere with a loud 'POP' before, but they had never travelled that way themselves.

"Really?" Harry asked, his mouth full of pancake

"Yeah, come on then" Sirius stood up and motioned for the kids to follow him and Remus out of the kitchen, giving them a somewhat evil smirk.

Lyra got up and followed her dad, Harry hot on her heels. They walked right out of the house and down the front garden path. Lyra looked up at her father confused and tugged on his sleeve to get his attention.

"Why're we leaving the house?" she asked peering up at him with her big, silvery eyes.

"We can't Apparate in and out of the house cause of the protection charms that're around it" he explained and Lyra nodded.

She didn't really understand why they had to walk so far just to Apparate, it was meant to save time and effort when you're travelling after all.

It wasn't until they'd left the grounds of the manor altogether that Remus decided they were far enough away from the house's protective enchantments to Apparate.

A wave of nervousness crashed over Lyra the instant her dad took her hand in his to do the side along travelling by the floo network affected her so badly, what would Apparating do to her?

She didn't have much time to think about this though because as soon as her dad was satisfied that she wouldn't let go or get separated from him he turned on his heel and she heard the distinct "POP" of someone Disapparating.

Lyra had thought about what it was like to Apparate but never in her wildest dreams did she think it'd be anything like was pitch black, blacker then any night she had ever seen, and it was like someone had taken all the air out of her lungs and from the space around her. Her chest constricted and a sharp pain shot through her temples. It felt like she was being squeezed through a teeny tiny tube that she was far too big for.

It went on for what felt to Lyra like hours, but she knew it was actually probably only a couple of seconds.

She felt like she was suffocating, there was no air getting to her body and she was starting to feel light-headed. Lyra was sure she was going to faint if she stayed like this any longer. The pain in her head was getting worse, and it was spreading down her back too.

And suddenly it was all over and she was standing next to her dad in a side street off Diagon Alley.

The sudden brightness was a shock to her system and hurt her eyes making her squint against the glare. Her head was still throbbing painfully but her back wasn't sore anymore.

The second the constricting force around her chest vanished she gulped in air like she had been under water for hours. This made the light-headedness even worse and her vision swam momentarily.

She swayed on her feet and started to keel towards the ground, luckily Sirius had lightning fast, Quidditch honed reflexes and caught and steadied her before she hit the ground.

Once she was alright her dad let go of her and smiled encouragingly, "You did great Pup, most people hurl their first time Apparating" he told her and she gaped at him anger taking over her.

"Why didn't you tell me that before we left?" she demanded

"Because if I did you wouldn't've come this way and we would've had to drive all the way here instead" he answered.

As he finished his sentence there was another "POP" from behind them and they turned around just in time to see Remus appear out of nowhere with Harry at his side. The young black haired boy looked slightly green and dizzy.

"You alright Cub?" Remus asked bending down so that he was at Harry's eye level. Harry nodded and took a few deep breaths.

"I'll be fine" he assured his uncle

"Did they tell you that people normally upchuck after their first time Apparating?" Lyra asked her brother more as an act of passive aggression aimed towards her father rather than out of curiosity.

Still Harry answered "No" uncertainly then turned to Remus, "She's not serious is she?" he asked hopefully.

"I'm afraid she is Cub" he said and patted him on the shoulder, "But on the bright side you didn't"

"I suppose" Harry shrugged

They walked out of the side street and onto the winding cobbled road that was Diagon Alley. It was probably the most interesting street you'll find anywhere in England. The magnificent street twisted and turned its way out of sight and was crammed with sort of tall, colourful buildings.

It was packed with people bustling about doing everything and anything. They passed a group of middle aged witches standing around a bookstore chatting about something or other.

Lyra loved coming to Diagon Alley, there were little shops everywhere selling everything you could imagine. She looked over at Harry who was looking around, craning his neck to get a good look at everything, like he wished he'd about eight more eyes.

People were always buzzing about with oddly shaped parcels and groups of adults stood about giving out about rising prices and things the ministry have done wrong lately. Gangs of children flocked to the toy stores and the slightly older ones were always found with their noses pressed against the broom shop windows.

The sun glinted off a stack of cauldrons across the street and nearly blinded her. She held her had to her eyes against the glare and looked around again. There was a soft hooting coming from Eeylop's Owl Emporium. There were big round eyes staring out of the dark shop at her as they passed.

A few minutes later they passed by a group of boys around Lyra and Harry's age, who were practically drooling, around a window with their faces squashed against the glass gazing at something in awe. There must be a new broom out. Lyra stood on her tiptoes to try and see over the tops of the boys' heads and catch a peek of what model it was. The new nimbus was supposed to be coming out soon.

"Where're we going dad?" Lyra asked as they walked away from the Quidditch supplies shop.

"Gringots" he told her and she made a face.

She didn't exactly like going to Gringots, though she had had to go there only once before. It wasn't that the goblins intimidated her, far from it, they seemed to be terrified of her for some reason, or that the carts made her sick, she actually loved the carts.

Going to her family's vault was what she didn't like about going to Gringots.

You see there are a lot of rumours about how the goblins protect the highest security vaults belonging to the oldest Wizarding families. Most people think these rumours are totally insane and couldn't possibly be true.

They would be very, very wrong. Nearly every single one of the rumours is, in fact, true and Lyra knew that from experience, her family's vault was one of the ones that received those defences.

This wasn't a disadvantage to the goblins having almost the whole world know how they kept their treasures safe, it made even the bravest, most cunning and ruthless of thieves cower away from the pearly white building.

It was those defences that Lyra hated, and for a good reason.

When the narrow street opened up to reveal the shining white marble building that was Gringots towering over the little shops of Diagon Alley Lyra set her jaw and told herself that she'd just deal with it, and eventually find a way to make the goblins pay for what they're doing to that poor creature.

Her dad and uncle guided her up the steps to the gleaming bronze doors, on either side of which were a goblin dressed in a red and gold uniform. The goblins were about the same size as Lyra and they had swarthy, clever looking faces, and very long fingers and feet. They bowed a little as their group walked inside.

For some strange reason there was another pair of doors, only these ones were silver and had words engraved on them. Lyra read them as they walked through

_Enter stranger, but take heed_

_Of what awaits the sin of greed,_

_For those who take, but do not earn,_

_Must pay most dearly in their turn,_

_So if you seek beneath our floors _

_A treasure that was never yours,_

_Thief, you have been warned, beware,_

_Of finding more than treasure there. _

Lyra shuddered as they passed the sick rhyme.

She'd really rather not knowing what thieves would come across if they had the balls, or just pure lack of brains, to try and rob this place. _You'd have to be fucking mental to try it,_ she thought, which meant a lot coming from Lyra.

They entered the long, expensive looking hall that was made of the exact same white marble as the outside of the building was. Hanging from the domed ceiling high above them was a massive grand chandelier that glittered in a way that seemed almost childlike.

Along the walls were high polished wood counters with dozens of goblins sitting at them on tall stools.

Dozens more goblins were showing people in and out of the countless doors that were scattered quite randomly around the walls of the hall.

They approached a free goblin and it looked up from it thick account book to peer down at them superiorly. Well, he lost the superior look the instant he laid eyes on the head of the 'Noble House of Black', their oldest, most prestigious, and one of their richest customers.

It was replaced by a forced smile that Lyra didn't think was any better than the look of contempt that had been written on his face before it.

"How may I help you today Lord Black?" he asked

"I would like to take some money from my daughter and son's vaults" he told the goblin with total disinterest in the forced politeness.

"Do they have their keys?" he asked turning his gaze to Lyra and Harry

"Here" Sirius said dropping two tiny golden keys onto the counter in front of the balding creature.

"They seem to be in order" the goblin confirmed after looking over them briefly, "Anything else?"

"I'm here on Hogwarts business" Remus spoke up and the goblin looked at him with a raised eyebrow. He took a letter out of his pocket that was sealed with the Hogwarts crest stamped into the purple wax. "Special orders from Dumbledore about you-know-what in vault 713"

The goblin took the letter and quickly scanned it then nodded his head.

"I'll have Griphook take you down" the goblin told them with his pointed teeth showing through his grin. "GRIPHOOK!" he yelled behind him and yet another goblin came out of nowhere and appeared from behind the counter.

Griphook led them through one of the many doors out of the fancy hall. The passages were not what you'd expect after the grand room before them. They were dank and cold with plain grey stone walls lit by flaming torches lined along the walls on either side. There was a set of train tracks running through the middle of the long narrow passage.

Griphook whistled and a clunky, old looking cart came rattling along before coming to a stop in front of them.

The humans and goblin climbed into the vehicle and sped off along the twisting windy route to the vaults. There was a perfectly logical reason the passages all had so many bends and turns and that the goblins took you a different route every other time you go to your vault.

It makes it that much harder to find your way around the maze of a dungeon without a goblin with you.

They whirled around corners at breakneck speed and raced along the track until they came to a sudden halt in front of a relatively new vault - compared with the ones Lyra was used to seeing that is.

They all climbed out of the cart and Remus had to stand still for a moment to try and regain his balance after the wild cart ride shook him up a bit.

"Key please" requested Griphook importantly as he stepped up to the vault. Sirius handed him one of the little golden keys which the goblin used to open the door with a series of resounding clicking noises as the bolts and locks became undone. The door swung open leaving out a cloud of weirdly smelling smoke.

Inside was an enormous pile of gold galleons, sliver sickles and bronze knuts. There was so much money stacked up in there that it nearly reached the ceiling. Sirius turned to Lyra's shocked face with a smirk.

"This is all yours Pup. Well until you turn seventeen anyway, then you get the rest of the trust fund. Plus interest" he explained and Lyra's jaw dropped

"That's not all of it?" she asked shocked

"Nope, and a good chunk of this's gonna be spent on your school stuff over the next seven years if you're anything like us"

"Padfoot supplies from Zonko's don't count as "school stuff" and you don't even have to guess that that's where most of this money is going" Remus said with a roll of his eyes.

"Honeydukes Moony" Sirius reminded him.

"How could I forget?" Remus asked dramatically

"You're the world's worst chocolate addict" Sirius chided

"I'm not addicted to chocolate!" Remus yelled back at him

While they were arguing Harry and Lyra had shoved a small pile of the money into a leather pouch.

They hadn't bothered to count it but they just hoped it would be enough for a while at least. They didn't really have much experience with how much things would cost at Hogwarts.

They left Lyra's vault and after a much shorter journey in the cart arrived at Harry's. It looked almost the exact same as Lyra's did.

Sirius explained to them that every trust vault that's worth more than a certain amount has the same amount of money left accessible until the trustee comes of age.

They grabbed some money for Harry and were whisked away in the cart once again. This time they were off to explore the mysterious vault number seven hundred and thirteen.

"What's in this vault that's so important?" Harry asked as they were thrown around another sharp turn and then down a steep drop.

"That's top secret Hogwarts business" Remus told him sternly, "and if I hear of you sticking your nose into it I'll take away all your wet start fireworks"

Harry gaped at him for a second before deciding to just stay quiet and try and contain his curiosity while around his uncle.

He could always ask Hagrid later.

They came to a jerky stop at a vault very low down in the tunnels.

When they approached the door this time Lyra noticed that it had no key hole. So it was one of _those_ vaults. Her curiosity was piqued by it instantly.

Whatever needed those doors to protect it was always incredibly valuable and/or dangerous. She wondered what it was, and what it did. Was it like one of those Muggle things, what d'you call them? WMDs, that's it.

"Stand back please" Griphook ordered in his superior tone and Lyra sent a glare at him. He ran a long finger down the middle of the door and Lyra heard a series of clicking and clacking before the door simply dissolved.

"If anyone but a Gringots goblin did that they'd be sucked right in and stuck there until someone let them out" he told them cheerfully.

"How often do you check for people in them?" Harry asked out of his, near constant, innocent curiosity.

"About once every ten years" Griphook said with a malicious grin.

See, its things like that that put thieves off trying to take this place on. Goblins will go to any lengths to protect their gold. That's what makes them the perfect people to run a bank.

Griphook stepped aside to allow them into the vault and Lyra eagerly leaned forward over the threshold expecting to see something impressive and mighty or incredibly expensive and beautiful.

She saw neither.

At first she thought the fault was empty, but soon saw that lying in the very middle of the vault was a grubby little package wrapped in brown paper. It couldn't be more than a few inches long.

Surely that grimy little thing didn't need such high protection?

There had to be something else in there.

What _was_ it?

Remus just walked into the room and picked up the little package. He stuffed it into a pocket somewhere on the inside of his coat and walked back out again. Lyra and Harry were both still looking around for something like what they expected from the vault. Lyra looked over to Harry to see he was sharing her disappointment.

"Shall we go then?" Remus asked and clambered back into the cart.

Lyra wanted to stay and have a look around the vault, totally sure that there must be something else hidden away in there. She was prevented by doing just that by her dad dragging her out of the vault and back into the damn cart.

The journey back seemed a lot longer than the one down.

It was a huge relief, for Remus at least, when it finally ended. He had the other three whisked away into Madame Malkin's before they could bring up what he'd taken from the vault. Lyra knew he was hoping that getting their school things would distract her and Harry from asking about the mysterious object.

Unfortunately for Lyra, Remus was once again totally right. They walked into the robe shop and Lyra had the sudden urge to turn and run straight back out the door. There were countless racks of clothes - Wizarding and Muggle - as far as she could see, and along one wall were shelves upon shelves of different types of materials going from the floor to the ceiling.

She never got the chance however because a short, stout, smiling witch dressed all in mauve popped up beside them as if she'd Apparated over.

"Hogwarts dears?" she asked, but didn't give any of them a chance to answer. She just dragged Harry and Lyra down to near the back of the shop, where they presumably did the robe fittings.

"Well we've got the lot here. There's another boy being fitted right now in fact"

As she said that Lyra spotted a boy with a pale, pointed face and platinum blond hair standing on a stool getting long black robes taken up to fit him by another, younger witch.

Madame Malkin placed Lyra and Harry on the two remaining stools so that Harry was between Lyra and the pale boy.

A third witch came out from behind one of the rows of robes and held out a long, plain black robe to Harry to put on. Madame Malkin was meanwhile looking Lyra up and down in a calculating, scrutinising way. Lyra just sent her a look to say 'get on with it already'.

"Hmm" the seamstress hummed to herself, taking in Lyra's unusually small and thin frame. Harry was quite scrawny and short for his age, but even he dwarfed her from his place beside her.

"I think I'm going to just have to make up one for you from scratch. I don't think we have any Hogwarts robes in your size"

With that she turned and bustled off in the direction of the wall of fabric. Lyra turned to her brother when she heard snickering to see him struggling to contain a fit of laughter as the witch was trying to pin his robe.

"Oh, shut up Harry" she said to him and all he did was laugh harder.

Lyra, very maturely, stuck her tongue out at him.

The pale boy then decided to start up a conversation with Harry.

"Hullo" he said in a droll, bored sounding voice that sounded very familiar to Lyra, "Hogwarts too?" he asked.

'Well obviously' Lyra thought with a roll of her eyes. Why else would they be getting fitted for _Hogwarts_ robes?

"Yes" was all Harry was able to say back, he was still chuckling at Lyra who was watching Madame Malkin looking for materials for her robes with an expression of pure dread etched into her face.

"My father's next door buying my books and mother's up the street looking at wands" he continued, oblivious to Harry's inattention to him, "Then I'm going to drag them off to look at racing brooms. I don't see why first years can't have their own. I think I'll bully father into getting me one and I'll smuggle it in somehow"

Lyra was strongly reminded of Harry's cousin Dudley.

"I doubt that'd work. They do check the luggage for things like that" Lyra said with a shake of her head at the boy. He ignored her and kept talking to Harry

"Do you have your own broom?" he asked casually

"No, I mostly use my uncle's old Nimbus. He got a new one a few months ago so he doesn't use it much anymore" Harry answered much more interestedly now that the conversation was starting to turn towards Quidditch.

The boy had a confused look as to why Harry would have to use his uncle's broom.

"Play Quidditch at all?"

"Yeah, a bit" he said with a nod of his head. Lyra nearly laughed at the massive understatement.

"I do too â€" father says it's a crime if I'm not picked to play for my house, and I must say, I agree. Know what house you'll be in yet?"

Merlin he was full of himself. Lyra actually laughed this time - and not quietly - when he said that, first years _never _got picked to play for the house teams.

"No, but my parents were both in the same house" Harry answered the last question leaving out a comment on what was said before it.

"Well no one really knows until they get there, do they, but I know I'll be in Slytherin, all my family have been - imagine being in Hufflepuff, I think I'd leave wouldn't you?" he said and Lyra felt her blood boil.

She looked at Harry and saw an expression of disbelief and anger on his face similar to what must be on hers. She felt like kicking the stool out from under the boy and letting him bash his head off the mirrors behind him.

"A good friend of mine is in Hufflepuff, she's already got a place with the Aurors, and she's going to be training with the best they've got" he said to the boy in a sharp tone.

The boy raised his eyebrows at Harry and said

"Really, who is she then?"

"Dora Tonks" Harry told him with a glare thrown his way for good measure.

Madame Malkin came back just then with three robes folded over her arm. She held up one of them against Lyra and nodded to herself.

"These'll do just perfect. I'll need you to put this one on, dear, to fit it properly though"

She handed Lyra the smooth material and she slid it over her head easily. To her surprise it fit her almost perfectly. This wasn't going to be half as painful as she'd thought. The seamstress got to work right away pinning the robe up properly and giving out to Lyra for fidgeting.

"I say look at that man!" the boy exclaimed suddenly, nodding towards the front window of the shop.

Hagrid was standing there holding a tray of ice-creams and talking to Remus and Sirius cheerfully.

"That's Hagrid" Harry said happily and Lyra waved out the window at him, causing her to receive another stern look from Madame Malkin and yet another 'hold still dear'.

"He works at Hogwarts" Harry told the boy.

"Oh" he said snootily "I've heard of him. He's sort of a servant, isn't he?"

"He's the gamekeeper" Harry said in a cold tone that told Lyra very clearly that he didn't like the boy much anymore. Though from what she could tell the boy was either ignoring it or completely oblivious to the tone as he went on.

"Yes exactly. I heard he's a sort of savage - lives in a hut in the school grounds and every now and then he gets drunk, tries to do magic and ends up setting fire to his bed"

Lyra turned to the boy and sent him the same glare that set the broom shed on fire. She was going to end up seriously hurting him if he didn't shut up in the next ten seconds.

"I think he's brilliant" Harry said to the boy irritably

"Do you" the boy said to Harry with a slight sneer on his face that made him look like someone stuck something that smelled horrid under his nose.

"At least Hagrid doesn't have a huge stick up his arse" Lyra said under her breath to Harry, but loud enough so the boy could hear her. He shot her a glare that could freeze hell over and was met with Lyra's patented skin melting one.

"Why is he with you? Where are your parents?"

"He's a friend of my uncle's" Harry said shortly, "My parents are dead"

"Oh, sorry" said the boy, he didn't sound sorry at all. "But they were _our kind_ weren't they?"

Steam was billowing out of Lyra's ears by now.

"They were a witch and a wizard, if that's what you mean"

"I really don't think they should let the other sort in, do you? They're just not the same; they've never been brought up to know our ways. Some of them have never even heard of Hogwarts until they get their letter, imagine. I think they should keep it in the old Wizarding families"

He was about to say something else but Lyra interrupted him, "You're a fucking prick!" she spat at him, about to lose her temper completely. "What do you even know, you're eleven, just going on what 'father' says. Well if they kept magic in the old Wizarding families it'd die out pretty quickly, or we'd all end up inbred, deformed squibs" she continued mocking his voice when she said 'father'.

The boy nearly fell off his stool in shock that the little girl who looked totally harmless swore at him like that, and so viciously. She could tell he was surprised she could instil a shiver of fear in him. He looked utterly outraged that she'd _dared_ to mock him.

After taking a moment to regain his composure he asked "What are your surnames anyway?"

Before Harry could answer the witch interrupted them, "That's you done dear, we'll have them all done up for you in a half hour"

Harry immediately hopped down from his footstool and slid his robe back over his head. He was very obviously happy for the excuse to stop talking to the arrogant boy.

Lyra however, wasn't so lucky.

"I'll see you at Hogwarts I suppose" he drawled to Harry who just nodded in return and headed out of the shop to join Remus, Sirius and Hagrid talking and eating their ice-creams.

The boy turned to Lyra with an expectant on his face. She laughed at him, not her usual bubbly, infectious laugh. This one was cold and mocking and it didn't suit her at all.

"One more word to me and I'll give you a black eye pretty boy" she warned looking quiet dangerous as she said it, "You're from an old Wizarding family; your mother should've brought you up to know not to cross a Black"

Before he had a chance to respond to that Lyra was saved by Madame Malkin, "You're done deary, I'll have them all done for you in about a half hour. You can come back and get them then"

"Thanks" Lyra said to the older woman giving her the signature charming Black smile and hopping off the stool. She took off the robe, handed it back to the witch, threw a smirk at the blond boy and left the shop.

"Hiya Hagrid!" Lyra greeted the half giant gleefully.

He smiled back down at her through his wild hair and beard, his warm, beetle like eyes lighting when he smiled like that. She took her ice-cream from Hagrid gratefully and ate it walking away with them at Harry's side.

"Hullo Lyra, I heard from an old headmaster that you're startin' at Hogwarts this year. Is that some sort a joke they're playin' or someat?" he asked.

Lyra chuckled and shook her head, "No"

Hagrid looked shocked momentarily then shook his head fondly at her and Harry, "Dumbledore's made a mistake this time, the school'll be in ruin by the end o' the year"

Harry and Lyra laughed with Hagrid at his joke but Sirius just turned to Remus and said totally serious

"You know he's probably right, don't you?"

"Yes, I couldn't have put it better myself"

"Old Dumbles really has lost it this time hasn't he? Letting us convince him to put them into school together"

"Oh definitely"


	6. Makers of Fine Wands Since 382BC

**Lyra Black and the Philospher's Stone**

**A/N** - Hello agian everyone! I'd like to give the usual thanks to all of you, everyone who's reviewed this story, and of course, to my beta hpfan224.

**Chapter 6 – Makers of Fine Wands Since 382 B.C.**

After they'd all finished their ice-creams they headed off to get the rest of their things. Harry and Lyra ended up being herded into Flourish and Blotts first to get their books even though they wanted to head off to Zonko's instead.

It was a vain hope that Remus and Hagrid would let them inside there under their watch.

Remus looked like he was in heaven when they entered the Flourish and Blotts, even Lyra who'd never been quite as interested in books as her uncle found this bookshop exciting.

There was a very good reason for this interest. The shop was made up of shelves upon shelves stacked to the ceiling with the most intriguing books you could ever imagine. Books as big as paving stones and dustbin lids bound in leather covers, tiny books, about the size of stamps, covered in silk and books full of strange symbols that Lyra couldn't read and a few books that had absolutely nothing in them at all.

Sirius had to practically drag Harry away from a book called _Curses and Counter-Curses (Bewitch your Friends and Befuddle your Enemies with the Latest Revenges: Hair Loss, Jelly-Legs, Tongue-Tying and much, much more) by Professor Vindictus Viridian_.

"I was trying to find out how to curse Dudley" he complained as Sirius dragged Harry back to the rest of their group.

On hearing this Lyra's attention was stolen from a book about Animagi – she'd always wanted to know more about them – and she too tried to peek into the Curse book.

"Now, I'm not saying that isn't a good idea Cub, but you'll need a hell of a lot more studying before you get to that level. Stick with something from your text books for now" he suggested to a very put out looking Harry, it was also directed to a disappointed Lyra. He clapped Harry on the shoulder and steered him over towards the school books section.

They got their books fairly quickly and left the shop, now significantly weighed down, to collect their robes from Madame Malkin's. Their next stop wasn't much more interesting, just to get quills, parchment and ink.

Lyra did manage to convince Sirius to let her buy a funny looking quill that's feather changed colour randomly from vibrant greens and deep blues to stormy blacks, greys and white.

And Harry also found a bottle of ink that changed colour as you wrote that both of the children found very amusing.

The apothecary's was a horrible smelling place with a lingering stench of bad eggs and rotten cabbages. It was a disgusting combination to assault the senses. The store made up for the horrid smell though, by being one of the most fascinating shops Lyra had ever entered.

Barrels of slimy stuff stood solidly on the floor. Jars of herbs, dried roots and brightly coloured powders lined the shelves on the walls. Bundles of odd feathers, strings of fangs and snarled looking claws hung from the ceiling.

While the adults were talking to the apothecary and getting Lyra and Harry each a set of basic potions ingredients, the two children took to opportunity to have a look around the mesmerizing place, letting them do this was a mistake on the adults part.

Lyra wandered around, looking at the unicorn hairs – twenty galleons each – and other things hanging from the ceiling that caught her attention. She did, of course, get bored of looking around after only a few minutes.

So while the adults weren't looking Lyra made her way over to the huge barrels of tiny, shining beetle eyes – five knuts a scoop – and took up a scoop of them. Instead of putting them into one of the paper bags hanging above them Lyra dumped them down the back of Harry's t-shirt.

"Lyra!" Harry yelled squirming and jerking around trying to get the disgusting potion ingredients out of his clothes.

Knowing that when he'd managed to do that Harry would kill her Lyra ran for it out of the shop and, dropping five knuts onto the counter as she dashed past laughing manically, out into the main street of Diagon Alley.

Harry was by now hot on her heels and furious.

"What now?" Remus groaned doing a face palm.

"Beetle eyes I'm guessing" Sirius answered him with a sigh as he watched Harry continue to try and remove them from his shirt out on the street.

Lyra had stopped running from her brother by now and was clutching her sides laughing at him, nearly knocking over a basket of caramel apples.

The racket the two of them were making was starting to draw the attention of passersby. People were stopping in their tracks on the street to stare at the two of them, who were still too distracted to notice all the attention they were attracting.

Lyra calmed down sooner than Harry and saw the crowd that was starting to gather around them.

This wasn't good and she knew it. The last time something like this had happened Harry was swarmed by a crazy horde of "admirers", who nearly trampled Lyra and Tonks at the same time. She tapped Harry on the shoulder to try and get his attention.

He stopped squirming for a minute to see what she wanted from him now. When he did finally see the throng of people around them he gulped nervously.

"Is that Harry Potter?" Lyra heard a man ask from somewhere in the crowd

"Yes, I think it is" another undistinguishable person answered

"Does he have the scar?" yet another person asked excitedly.

As all thoughts of revenge disappeared from Harry's mind. The two kids looked to each other for some kind of brilliant idea to get them out of this situation. Neither one of them had a clue.

All of a sudden the crowd rushed them and Harry was swamped by a mass of people who were practically attacking each other to get close to him, and smothering him with calls and raptures of "It's such an honour to meet you" and "Harry Potter, so good to see you".

They were yelling over each other to be heard by the Boy Who Lived and it was starting to give Lyra a headache.

They all wanted to shake his hand and every last one of them was sure as hell determined not to leave until they did so. Lyra had to cling to Harry for dear life so she wouldn't get separated from him. She was sure to get hurt if she was sucked into the frenzied crowd.

They were separated shortly by a big, rude man who shoved Lyra out of the way roughly so that he could get closer to Harry.

After she was shoved away from her brother Lyra was bustled somewhere else in the throng of people and couldn't even see Harry anymore. No one would move for her no matter how hard she tried to push through them.

Her infamous temper was starting to flare up wildly and she couldn't control it much longer.

_Maybe a verbal assault might help _she thought and stood still to suck in a deep breath and take a firmer stance against the adults surrounding her. After a short moment she roared out at the top of her lungs

"MOVE!" and people had to cover their ears, and looked around for the person who they assumed to have used the Sonorus charm on themselves.

When they were properly distracted Lyra made a lunge towards the person in front of her and violently shoved and shouldered them out of her way.

"Get OUT of my WAY!" she yelled as she pushed her way through the crowd.

When they saw that she wasn't at all above using violence against them, and was very capable of shifting them forcefully the crowds started to part much more easily for her.

Once Lyra got to Harry she grabbed his arm and charged back through the crowd again in the direction of the apothecary's. The only reason she knew what direction it was in was because she could see the sign hanging high above the heads of the crowd.

Standing outside the shop wearing expressions of extreme relief were Sirius – who had his wand drawn and was about to barge into the crowd hexing people – Remus – who was trying to restrain Sirius – and Hagrid – who was using his massive height to see in over the thick mass of people to locate Harry and Lyra.

As soon as the two were within is arm's reach Sirius grabbed both of them into a protective hug and proceeded to give anyone who looked their way death glares. Maybe he should stop them wandering off from now on.

Hagrid dealt with the crowd while Remus and Sirius made sure Lyra and Harry were alright.

"Alrigh', on with yeh! Nothin' to see here, go on!"

They dispersed instantly for fear of the wrath of Hagrid – though Hagrid wasn't really the type to have a wrath, but those idiots didn't need to know that.

He was pretty intimidating to look at if you didn't know how much of a big softie he was on the inside. His eight foot height, broad, strong build, thick wild hair and beard and black eyes were a pretty threatening sight to strangers. None of them took the time to take in the warmth Hagrid's dark eyes held, or the pleasant way he spoke to people. To them he was just a threat. Dangerous. So they fled when he told them to. Their ignorance came in useful from time to time.

Harry and Lyra checked their lists after the incident at the apothecary's. The only thing they had left to get was their wands. That was the part of the day Lyra was most looking forward to, getting her own magic wand. The day was finally here! There was no more need for her to steal her dad's or uncle's, she'd have her very own in only a few minutes.

She was buzzing with excitement as they approached Ollivander's. She was practically bouncing on the spot when her dad pointed out the narrow, shabby looking shop with pealing gold letters over the door reading _Ollivander's: Makers of Fine Wands since 382BC_. She saw in the dusty window a single wand that lay on a faded purple cushion.

As Sirius opened the door Lyra heard a bell ring from somewhere deep inside the store. The tiny room was empty except for a gangly old chair in the corner. They had to say their goodbyes to Hagrid as they walked in. Moony handed him the package they'd taken from Gringots. It was Hagrid's job to get the mysterious little package back to Hogwarts.

"Are you gonna tell us what's in the package yet uncle Moony?" Lyra asked Remus whose only response was to shake his head vehemently, "You know we'll find out what it is eventually. It's going to Hogwarts after all, and so're we"

Remus' expression became suddenly grave and concerned.

"Lyra if you even dare thinking about finding that package when you get to school I swear to Merlin…" he trailed off leaving whatever threat he was going to use unsaid.

That only served to ignite Lyra's curiosity about the object even further.

"It's far too dangerous for you to get involved in" he tried to warn her

"If it's dangerous and top secret then why'd you take us with you to get it?" Harry asked and Remus was at a loss for words, seemingly unable to find an answer to that question, or only just now realising his mistake

They lapsed into silence after that and as they waited for Ollivander to come out Lyra's hairs were starting to stand on end for some reason. She felt as if she'd just walked into an overly strict library with a nasty librarian, she wasn't overly fond of the feeling.

As Lyra looked around at the hundreds of piles of long narrow boxes that were stacked up neatly to the ceiling she felt a strange energy around the shop. The back of her neck began to prickle uncomfortably as she stood with Harry. She could tell from the way he was standing now that he was feeling similar to her. She was glad that she wasn't the only one getting the weird vibes from the place.

It was as if the dust covering every surface of the shop and the charged silence of the store were layered with a secret sort of magic. Lyra took a good look around the dusty shop with its peeling paint and found that it reminded her far too much of her nightmare. But she couldn't put her finger on why.

Being in the room made her feel on edge and she didn't like it one bit.

"Good afternoon" a soft voice said from out of nowhere.

Harry jumped nearly out of his skin at the sudden appearance of another person and Lyra whirled around to face them. Remus must've jumped too, because an odd crunching noise came from the gangly chair he was sitting on and he stood up quickly.

The sudden new arrival was an old man with wide, pale eyes that shone like full moons in the gloomy shop. He was standing right in front of Harry and gazing at him intently.

"Hello" Harry greeted the strange old man awkwardly

"Ah, yes" the old man breathed in his soft whispery voice, "Yes, yes. Indeed, I thought I'd be seeing you in my shop soon enough Harry Potter" he didn't say this as a question, it was more like he was just thinking out loud really, "You have your mother's eyes" he continued, "It seems like only yesterday that she was in here herself buying her first wand. Ten and a quarter inches long, swishy, and made of willow. It was a nice wand for charm work"

Mr. Ollivander moved closer to Harry. Lyra had been staring at his big eyes ever since he appeared, mentally begging them to blink. They were just too creepy to her if he kept staring like that.

He kept on talking without pause, "Your father on the other hand, he favoured a mahogany wand. Eleven inches, pliable, a little more powerful and excellent for transfiguration. Well, I say your father favoured it, but it's really the wand that chooses the wizard, of course"

By now Ollivander had come so close to Harry that he and Harry were almost nose to nose. Lyra was liking the old man less and less every second. There was just something about him that put her off.

"And that's where…" Mr. Ollivander touched the lightning scar on Harry's forehead lightly with a long, pale white finger.

"I'm sorry to say I sold the wand that did it" he told Harry softly with genuine regret seeping into his gentle tones.

Lyra gaped at him. He made Voldemort's wand? Really?

"Thirteen and a half inches, yew. A powerful wand, very powerful, and in the wrong hands…well if I'd known at the time what that wand was going out into the world to do…" he didn't finish, instead he trailed off with a heavy sigh.

He shook his head, probably to try and rid his mind of an unwanted thought. It was only then that he spotted Sirius and Remus. He looked very happy to see them, and a lot less creepy with the joy lighting up his old, gaunt face.

"Remus! Remus Lupin! It's lovely to see you again. I hear you're teaching at Hogwarts…olive, ten inches, unicorn tale hair core" he said to Remus delightedly, now coming across far less eerie.

"Yes, it is" Remus replied, "I've been teaching at the school for a few years no" he told the old wand-maker who smiled again and turned to Sirius.

"Sirius Black…" he stopped to think for a moment, "Griffon feather and chestnut…rather flexible, very good for defensive magic" he said and Sirius nodded.

"Yup, it's still soldering on"

Ollivander chuckled and turned back to Harry.

"Well now, Mr Potter. Let me see" he said more to himself as he took out a long, bright yellow tape measure with silver markings on it from his pocket. "Which is your wand arm?"

Harry looked totally bewildered by the question, obviously not knowing what Ollivander meant by "wand arm" and came out with "Err – well…I'm right handed?"

Lyra giggled quietly at him even though she hadn't had a clue what he'd meant by wand arm either.

"Yes that's it. Now hold out your arm" he measured Harry from shoulder to finger, then walked away leaving the tape measure to do the work itself. "Every Ollivander wand has a core of a powerful magical substance, Mr Potter. We use unicorn hairs, phoenix feathers, the heartstrings of dragons and feathers of griffons, to name but a few. Know that no two Ollivander wands are the same, just as no two unicorns or dragons are the same. And, of course, you will never get as good results with another's wand" he lectured away as he flitted along the different shelves taking down boxes at random as he went along.

"That will do" he said over his shoulder and the tape measure crumpled to the ground in the middle of measuring the distance between Harry's knuckles.

By the look of surprise on his face Lyra guessed that Harry hadn't taken any notice of the fact that the measuring tape was still working away.

"Right then Mr Potter. Try this one. Beech wood and dragon heartstring, nine inches, nice and flexible. Just take it and give it a wave" he said encouragingly.

Harry took the wand and looking distinctly uncomfortable started to wave it around a bit, but it was snatched away from him again almost at once by Ollivander. The old man simply handed him a different wand.

"Maple and phoenix feather, seven inches, quite whippy. Try –"

Harry tried this one too, but like the last one, he hadn't even gotten to raise it properly when it too was grabbed away from him by Ollivander.

"No, no, no, here – ebony and unicorn hair, eight and a half inches, springy. Go on, go on, try it out"

Harry was a bit reluctant to try waving the wand around again. Either because he didn't want to look like a total idiot or if he was a bit put off by Ollivander snatching the wands back from him so suddenly Lyra couldn't tell.

He did try it in the end. But it too was seized by Ollivander.

Harry tried, and tried and tried, but none of them worked.

Lyra got bored after the first few and was now sitting on the – now definitely broken – chair as the pile of wands on the dusty counter grew steadily bigger and bigger. Personally she had no idea what Ollivander appeared to be waiting for, but she sure as hell hoped it'd happen soon.

Very much unlike her, the more and more wands Ollivander pulled off the shelves and were rejected the happier he got. Lyra was starting to genuinely think the old wand-maker was insane.

"A tricky customer eh?" he said with a gleam in his moonlike eyes,

"Not to worry, we'll find the perfect match for you in here somewhere – I wonder – yes, why not – it's an unusual combination – holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches, nice and supple"

Harry took the latest wand to be handed to him. He looked a lot more comfortable this time then he had any other.

He raised the wand above his head and brought it swishing back down through the dingy air of the shop. A stream of red and gold sparks shot from the end of it like fireworks as he did, throwing dancing spots of light onto the walls.

Lyra hopped out of the chair – which made another worrying crunching sound – and whooped and clapped along with Sirius, Remus and Ollivander.

"Oh, bravo! Yes indeed, oh, very good" Ollivander exclaimed, "well, well, well…how curious…how very curious indeed" he muttered away to himself as he put Harry's wand back in its box and wrapped it in brown paper for him.

"Curious…curious" he continued to mutter to himself.

Harry's natural curious nature got the better of him because of this and he was prompted by it to ask "Sorry. But what's curious?"

When Harry finished speaking Ollivander landed him firmly with his pale stare.

"I remember every wand I've ever sold Mr Potter" he stated,

"Every single one. And is just so happens that the phoenix who gave the tail feather for _your_ wand gave another feather. Just one other. It is very curious indeed that you would be destined to wield this wand when its brother gave you that scar"

Lyra's jaw actually dropped and she saw Harry swallow nervously. Her father and uncle were both wearing expressions of as much shock as she was.

"Thirteen and a half inches. Yew." Ollivander continued, "Curious indeed how these things happen you know. The wand chooses the wizard remember…. I think we should expect great things from you Mr Potter. After all He Who Must Not Be Named did great things – terrible, horrible things yes – but great"

Lyra saw Harry shiver. Luckily Sirius and Remus finally got their voices back and interrupted.

"Lyra, I suppose we should find one for you now too" Sirius said to try and change the direction of the conversation.

It was a testament to the shock he'd gotten that he called Lyra by her first name. He only ever called her by it when he was incredibly angry, or in the unlikely event that he was actually serious about something for once. It was always Pup otherwise.

"Miss Black" Ollivander said, sounding a bit shocked himself this time. It was as if he was only now taking note of her presence at all. "I didn't think I'd be finding you a wand for quite some time yet"

"Well apparently you are" Lyra answered him sounding confident beyond her years.

She wasn't sure she like Ollivander yet, in fact she was quite sure that she didn't like him at all, and she never wanted to let anyone think she was someone they could take advantage of easily. Lyra tended to act incredibly rude to people when she felt like that. At that moment she was hoping that he'd find her a wand in a few minutes and they'd be out of there.

"I see" Ollivander said and just stared at her thoughtfully for a moment. This time he didn't bother with the tape measure and just went around grabbing wands from the shelves again after flicking his own wand at the ones he'd pulled out for Harry making them zoom back into place.

"Try this one, just give it a wave" he said handing Lyra a wand smaller than any of the ones Harry had tried.

"Chestnut, eight inches, dragon heartstring core"

She took the wand, but as soon as her hand closed around it an icy cold feeling shot up her arm and she dropped it again immediately.

The other four in the room waited for her to pick it up again, giving her confused looks. But Lyra only grimaced at it and looked to Ollivander to give her a different one to try. There was _no way_ she was touching that again. The mere thought of it sent a tremulous shudder of discust through her.

Ollivander smiled at her knowingly, and flicked his wand at the one on the floor so it flew back up onto the counter.

"Not the one eh?" he asked and Lyra shook her head.

"This is very interesting" he said gleefully and handed her another wand.

"Cherry and phoenix feather, much more powerful" he told her

That one shot a horrible sensation up her arm when she held it too, only this time it was almost like an electric shock. She dropped it and jumped backward, stunned by the strong zap she got from it.

This routine carried on for a while and the pile of wands on the counter grew to be as big as – maybe even bigger then – the one that had accumulated while they were looking for Harry's wand. Ollivander was now standing in between two isles of his wands and rubbing his chin thoughtfully.

Suddenly, he spun around and went through a door to the back of his shop, leaving the four customers staring after him with very puzzled looks adorning their faces.

"Any idea what he's doing?" Sirius asked Remus who shook his head still looking after Ollivander with raised eyebrows.

"Why d'you both have to be so picky?" Sirius whined and sat down on the gangly chair that creaked a little in protest to his weight being put on it.

When Ollivander came back a few minutes later he looked a lot happier and was holding an ancient looking box that was even dustier then the ones in the front of the shop.

He gently blew the dust off the box and opened it. When Lyra laid her eyes on the magnificent wand she felt her hand twitch toward it of its own accord.

It was a simple, but very beautifully designed wand with odd, intricate symbols that Lyra vaguely recognised from somewhere carved delicately into the hilt. It was very small though, just like all the other wands Lyra had tried that day.

"This is an incredibly old wand" Ollivander told her, "Centuries old in fact, and it still has never chosen a witch or wizard. Made of ebony, quite short, only seven inches. Immovable." he handed it to Lyra carefully and a wonderful warmth spread through her entire body.

She grinned and turned toward the chair her dad had vacated when Ollivander came back. She gave the wand a quick flick at the chair and it exploded into thousands of pieces.

"Ok, excellent!" Ollivander cried when he stood up straight again after shielding himself from the flying debris. He applauded along with Sirius and Remus and Harry clapped her on the back and she smirked at him.

"You're gonna have a hell of a year Moony" Sirius commented casually

"I know" Remus sighed, then laughed

"It is quite an achievement to win the allegiance of this wand" Ollivander told Lyra as he wrapped her wand for her.

"Why?" she asked quirking her head to the side enquiringly

"Because, while every Ollivander wand _is_ one of a kind, this one is particularly unique. It contains a core that has not been used in thousands of years, and even then it was only used very scarcely" he explained, "This wand is said to be one of only three wands left on earth using a core of its kind"

"Why would a core not be used if it worked well?" Lyra asked

"Wizards feared its power, and the beings it came from, and still do to this day" he said barley above a whisper now,

"Wizards have always feared the ones who could harness the power of demons, the creatures themselves are another story. While their hair, blood, flesh and claws or nails are coveted as a potent magical substance, only one in a million wizards has had the nerve to approach one to obtain any of them"

"Wait – my wand, it's got one of those as a core?" Lyra said disbelievingly

"Yes, the hair and blood of a high-priestess" Ollivander whispered to her, "The Destroyer"

After that little piece of information, Lyra hastily payed for her wand and left the shop with her brother, father and uncle in toe. After waiting so long to get a wand she wanted nothing more than to leave that place and, hopefully, never go back.

When Ollivander told her about wand's core…it was almost as if he knew something about her, something that no one else wanted her to know.

Things were just getting a bit too weird for her liking.

After dinner that evening Lyra decided she wanted to try out her new wand. She hadn't been able to put it down since she got it and was dying to use it. So she pulled out one of the spell books and whipped out her wand.

It still felt amazing to hold it, it was just right, even if the core did come from something supposedly so evil. As she was about to raise it to try and perform a simple spell her attention was grabbed by the design engraved into it.

It was very unusual for a wand to have something like this carved into its hilt; they were normally quite simple and plain.

She had once seen a wand with those Celtic never-ending-knot designs on it. But it was belonging to the man one of her cousins married. He was descended from Brain Boru, the last high king of Ireland, and that wand had been passed down through the family for hundreds of years.

The symbols were incredibly weird and gave her the feeling that the wand was even older then Ollivander had said. What was even stranger to Lyra was that she didn't find any of the symbols all that unusual. She didn't know how, as she had never seen them before in her life as far as she could remember. Taking a closer look at them she could pick apart what each of them was and meant, but she didn't understand what they were telling their reader about. What they read didn't make any sense to her.

"What're you doing?" a voice asked from behind her and Lyra whirled around to see who it was, only to find Harry standing in her doorway looking at her with a raised eyebrow

"Just looking at the designs on my wand" she shrugged, "What d'you want?"

"Dunno, got bored" he answered and walked to sit next to her on the floor, "you're reading your books already?"

"Not really" she answered, "I wanted to try out a spell"

"Why?" Harry questioned.

She could tell he was up to something; he never quizzed her like this unless he wanted information of some kind.

"Not sure, I just wanted to" she decided to change the way the conversation was going, "Anyway, want to go annoy uncle Moony? Cause I wanted to try out that spell dad's always going on about"

"Yeah, sure" Harry agreed smirking, "But don't think I've forgotten about the Beetle eyes" he warned her

Lyra just rolled her eyes at him and said, "I can't wait to see the look on his face"

The two of them then ran of excitedly to torment Remus relentlessly until Sirius intervened, declaring it was time for them to go to bed, and hauled them forcibly away to their separate rooms, where they would hopefully stay for the night.

Just to be on the safe side he locked their doors so they couldn't get out and get himself or Remus in their sleep, or go terrorising the house.

Later when he sat down on his favourite armchair in the sitting room Sirius let out a heavy sigh and looked over to Remus. Remus lifted his eyes from the book he was engrosed in when he felt the other man looking at him. On seeing Sirius' exhausted slouch and worn expression Remus couldn't help but laugh to himself at the other Marauder.

"This is no laughing matter Moony" Sirius stated indignantly

"Alright then Padfoot" Remus said trying to school his epression, "What's bothering you?" he asked still sounding like he was repressing laughter

"Harry's wand has an evil twin!" he exclaimed gesturing wildly with his hands

"Relax Sirius, it's not like that's going to matter. When is Harry ever going to meet Voldemort again? He's barley alive" Remus tried to sooth the other man

"Really Moony? You do realise it's Harry we're talking about right. And wherever Harry is, Lyra is. And that between the two of them they're cursed with the worst luck anyone has ever seen"

"Yes" Remus insisted, "But like I was trying to tell you, they'll be safe at Hogwarts, and if anything does happen because of the twin cores, though I doubt it will, we'll be able to handle it"

"Whatever you say Moony" Sirius responded disbelievingly, and continued, "But say nothing comes from Harry's wand's evil twin, what about Lyra's wand?"

"What about it?" Remus asked in response, tilting his head to the left ever so slightly trying to desipher what Sirius was trying to say

"Demon core Moony! Demon! And not any old demon. No, we wouldn't be that lucky" he started to rant

"And" Remus interrupted

"You know as much about demons as I do Moony. It's bad news when they get involved wtih a human. Really, really bad"

"Sirius, I know, I do, but we've got everything under control. Lyra will be fine"

After a pause Remus thought about what Sirius had said and asked

"What do you mean 'not any old demon'?"

"You know who The Destroyer was don't you?" Sirius answered his question with another question

"Oh" was all Remus said

After another minute Sirius let out a sudden barking laugh. Remus gave him an odd look. A minute ago he had been foreboding and worried. Then again, he didn't really expect Sirius to stay in such a... mature state of mind for very long.

"What?" Remus asked hesitantly

"They're pretty weird kids aren't they" Sirius commented and Remus smiled as well and nodded in agreement, "Why couldn't they be at least a little more normal. It'd be easier to deal with. I mean the wand chooses a wizard for a reason right?"

This time it was Remus' turn to let out a laugh, "Because they're yours and James' kids" he shot back at the dog Animagus, "And you wouldn't have them change for anything would you?"

"No. I wouldn't" Sirius admitted, "I'd acutally be more worried if they weren't so unusual. I'd always be thinking they were up to something I didn't know about"


	7. The Hogwarts Express

**Lyra Black and the Philosopher's Stone**

**A/N** - Hello again! It's update time! I'd like to thank hpfan224, my beta, and everyone who's read or reviewed this story.

**Chapter 7 – The Hogwarts Express**

That summer was probably one of the best of Lyra's life. Her and Harry spent the rest of their time free of school fixing their planned pranks and making up totally new ones – which were enough to last anyone a few years now – and trying out a few bits and pieces of them around the house.

It was safe to say they were driving Sirius, Remus and the poor house elves, Lala and Foster, insane.

What time of hers wasn't spent on pranking, basically Harry and Sirius' Quidditch training time, Lyra spent learning how to do all the spells she possibly could from her books.

She found it did take quite a lot of effort to master the first few, but after that she got through the rest of them alright. They weren't half as complicated as the ones she and Harry were planning to use for their recreational purposes.

She had been a little unsure of telling anyone that she had figured out why the carvings on her wand looked so familiar to her. She _had_ seen them somewhere before. But not in the conscious world. They were the type of ones that had adorned the temple room she had gone to in her nightmare.

Lyra didn't dwell on that for long though. All she wanted to do was put that as far out of her mind as possible. Instead she spent her free time occupying her thoughts with learning new pieces of music, which didn't take very long and she soon ran out of them. So to replace some of the time she would've been spending at the piano she learned the first few chapters of her books, only the interesting ones though.

Her history of magic book was left sullen and under used through all of this. Actually, about a week after she got it Lyra couldn't for the life of her find it, and it wouldn't be found at all for years to come.

But, the summer did eventually have to come to an end. This meant that Lyra's carefree days of playing music, pranking her guardians, practising magic and generally wreaking havoc on her familiar surroundings were also at an end until next summer.

She was incredibly excited to be going to Hogwarts, but like everyone she was anxious about leaving behind the life that had been mostly very good to her and moving onto something new and totally different.

The Hogwarts Express left from platform nine and three quarters at exactly eleven o'clock. This meant getting up quite early to be there on time, something Lyra was not very happy about since she had forgotten, once again, why she was being woken up so early that morning.

Sirius' waking her up went very similarly to the morning of their trip to Diagon Alley, only this time Lyra knew what she was doing when it came to using her powers. So, instead of just being thrown back onto his arse Sirius got slammed into the wall on the other side of the room and a jet of slime bright green slime shot at him. When he got back up he took a look down at himself, then at his daughter who was sitting still cocooned by her blankets and looking innocently up at him.

"Why?" he asked simply.

"You know I don't like being woken up. I thought you'd've learned from the last time you tried this", she rasped sleepily, her eyes narrowing threateningly

"Well" Sirius said looking exasperated now, "Why did I wake you up the last time?" he asked

"We had to go to Diagon Alley", she answered with a jaw breaking yawn

"And this time we've to go to King's Cross", he told her and just rolled his eyes when Lyra did a sort of seizure-like movement, it was quite like what Sirius did whenever he freaked out at Remus, and sprang from the bed looking around frantically. This looked hilarious considering she had a massive case of bed-head.

"That's today!" she yelled

"Sure is Pup", Sirius grinned at her, "You completely forgot didn't you?"

"You think?" Lyra snapped, Sirius just laughed at her.

"I knew you would, so I woke you up earlier then I was supposed to so you'd have time to pack"

Lyra wasn't even listening to him. She was rushing around the room trying to find where she'd left her books – all in different places of course. As he was about to finish that sentence Lyra shoved him out of the room and slammed the door shut.

She ran around the room like a whirlwind, throwing things haphazardly into her open trunk like her life depended on it. When she had everything she needed for school tossed in she breathed a deep sigh of relief. Now it was time for the important things. She launched herself under her bed and grabbed a bag that was hidden under there. This small, simple bag could be easily mistaken for a money pouch. But what was in there was a lot more dangerous than money. It was all of Lyra's pranking supplies.

Now you wouldn't think she could fit much into that little bag. She couldn't, until she found a very handy shrinking spell in one of her books. No one would suspect a thing, especially since she was carrying it with her and not putting it in her trunk.

Lyra knew that if her aunt Min looked over the student's trunks and didn't find anything against the rules in hers she would be very suspicious. To avoid any unnecessary snooping on the part of her aunt Lyra had left a few of her wet start fireworks in her trunk for Minerva to confiscate. That should keep her perfectly unaware of their real firepower until their first prank.

Lyra was infinitely grateful that none of her family members, other than Harry that is, had at that point discovered her devious and cunning side.

About a half hour later Lyra was all pack and ready to go, but still walking around like she was half comatose she was so tired. She _really_ had to stop staying up till all hours of the morning when she had to get up early the next day, because this was starting to get ridiculous.

At the minute she was half way through a plate of scrambled eggs and a pile of toast. Sadly there was no time for pancakes. Lala was standing at the cooker making up Remus and Harry's, the two of them had only just gotten up. But the two of them had packed last night and were ready to head out in a few minutes anyway. _Damn them_ Lyra thought crankily.

They would be driving to London that morning. This meant that they had to get up really, really early. That was something that Lyra wasn't very pleased with, but she was willing to give up a little sleep if it meant she didn't have to Apparate. And she could always sleep on the train after all.

The drive took forever in Lyra's mind and by the time they'd finally arrived at King's Cross in London Lyra was actually fully awake and thoroughly bored. Thankfully for her the trip through the station was much more eventful then the one to get there. She and Harry saw a guard and decided to go annoy him for a bit of fun while their guardians were finding trolleys for their luggage – they weren't allowed to handle anything like that ever since they had a race on them through the station one time when they went to see Tonks off.

They walked up to the man and started asking him questions about any trains leaving at eleven. According to him, there were none.

Then they asked about platform nine and three quarters – the special hidden platform that the Hogwarts Express left from. And he started to get really mad. Eventually he stormed away to from them, his face contorted in anger. As he marched away he muttered away to himself moodily about "time wasters".

Lyra and Harry snickered to themselves as they listened to him until he was out of earshot. They turned around to go back to the car and were shocked to find Sirius standing behind them with his arms crossed over his chest and an eyebrow quirked at them.

"What were you two doing to that poor Muggle?" he asked suspiciously

"Nothing", they both answered in perfect unison, "Just asking him a few questions is all"

"Right", Sirius said, obviously not believing their seemingly innocent intentions, "Well let's get going then, we've only a few minutes to get there before the train takes off"

"Okay", they both agreed and followed the elder Black into the station where Remus was waiting for them, wearing an expression that asked 'what've they been up to now?' Sirius shook his head in a way that replied 'nothing life threatening'

They walked through the station – ignoring the confused looks Hedwig was getting from the Muggles along the way – until they reached the barrier between platforms nine and ten. Sirius and Lyra started walking towards the solid looking brick wall casually. If anyone was watching them they would've thought the two were going to crash right into it. But just as they were about to collide head on with the barrier everything around Lyra went dark and she then found herself standing in a totally different place to where she was before.

Platform nine and three quarters looked a lot like some descriptions she had read of Muggle train stations from the nineteenth century. Back in the time when the old roaring steam engines were top of the range new inventions. Along the other side of the platform was a long gleaming scarlet steam engine that had thick puffs of white smoke billowing out of its chimney. That was the Hogwarts Express.

The walkway around the train was swamped with people; families of students come to see them off. They wouldn't see them again until Christmas, or summer for a few of them. The platform was always noisy and hard to move around, with groups of people stood together chatting and exchanging last minute goodbyes, and young children chased each other around the place laughing gleefully. Owls were hooting at each other from different trolleys, quite a few sounding very disgruntled at being stuck in a cage. Cats of every colour, species and description snaked their way around the place, winding through and around people's legs. Lyra even saw a toad hopping along the ground at one stage, barley avoiding getting stepped on.

Lyra had always liked the platform. She didn't know why, she just did. It might have been because of her absolutely aching longing to go to Hogwarts, and the platform was where she would eventually leave from to get there.

As they neared the other side of the train Lyra overheard a young round faced boy, probably a first year like her, talking to his grandmother.

"Gran, I've lost my toad again!" he groaned

"Oh, Neville!" the old woman, who was wearing a strange hat with some kind of stuffed vulture on it, sighed back at the boy, exasperated.

They were cutting it pretty close to leaving time, so almost all the seats had been taken. The only empty compartments were at the very end of the train. Remus and Sirius helped the two of them heave and drag their trunks into the compartment at the very back left of the train and the small family returned outside to say goodbye for the first time.

It was a terribly sad occasion for her parents, Lyra could tell. She knew her dad loved her more than anything on earth, and it was harder for him to part with her then it would've been for him to give up ranting about Quidditch matches after listening to them on the radio every Sunday – he did so almost religiously. She knew how he felt. He, along with Harry and Remus, really was all the world to her. She did love Harry and Remus deeply, but whenever something was wrong it was always her dad she went to. It was him she went to if she was having trouble with a spell lately, even though Remus was a teacher. It was always him she thought of before she pulled a prank...

Would this one give him a run for his money?

Would he be proud of her, or angry? (Either would do really, she loved tormenting him as much as she did anything else).

Who would tell her stories about the marauders?

Who would play the piano with her for hours on end?

Who would keep Snape from bullying her?

Lyra hadn't thought of it much until this very minute, but she was going to miss her dad like she'd miss the sun if it died. She made a half sad, half delighted parting with him that morning.

"Try to be good Pup", Sirius said to her as he pulled Lyra into a tight hug, "And listen to your aunt Min and uncle Moony. Try not to get into too much trouble and don't do anything I wouldn't do"

"That's a short list", Remus commented sassily and got a hard slap in the arm from Sirius for his troubles. "What? It is"

"Shhh!" Sirius hissed at him as Harry and Lyra snickered.

"Cub, don't let your sister do anything too crazy, and try to behave", Sirius pleaded with Harry as he pulled him into a bone crushing hug.

"I'll try", Harry promised, with a smile that said he would most definitely fail.

"Have fun, the both of you", he said to them and ruffled their hair.

"I'll see you two at the feast", Remus said with a wink, "Enjoy the Sorting"

There was a sudden shrill shriek of a whistle that made Lyra jump in surprise. It couldn't be eleven already, could it? She glanced over at the large clock hanging on the brick wall and saw that it was in fact time to go. She along with Harry and every other student on the platform was bustled on to train hurriedly. Lyra leaned out the window of the door at the very end of the train for a last goodbye to her father with Harry was dangling out beside her, a vibrant gleam in his excited eyes.

"We'll see you at Christmas uncle Padfoot", he said and Sirius chuckled at him

"You'll probably be seeing me before then Cub", he said with a wink.

"What?" Lyra asked confused, students weren't allowed to go home to visit relatives before Christmas except under special circumstances "Why?"

"You'll see", he told her just as the train started to move slowly away from him and Remus. Lyra tried to call back at them to question them further but the train was starting to gain speed, taking them further apart, and making far too much noise for them to hear her.

Lyra and Harry kept hanging out the window waving to Remus and Sirius until the train rounded a corner and blocked the platform from view. They pulled themselves back into the carriage and made their way into their compartment a lot more quietly then they usually were. It was only when they were securely stowed away in their compartment that they spoke.

"What d'you think dad meant about seeing us before Christmas?" Lyra mused stretching out along the seats on one side of the small space.

"Dunno", Harry replied carelessly, doing the same as Lyra on the other side of the compartment, "We'll get Hagrid to tell us"

"Yeah, that won't be too hard", Lyra agreed.

They lapsed into silence for a moment before Harry spoke up again, "So, what house d'you think you'll be sorted into?"

Lyra looked over at him, a little surprised by his question. They hadn't brought up houses in any of their conversations about school before. She should've expected it to come up at some point. But she hadn't ever really cared about what house she was put into. She knew her dad wanted her to be a Gryffindor like he and the other marauders were, but she was pretty sure she'd be happy in almost any house. Well maybe not Hufflepuff, she wasn't quite good natured enough for that particular house. Ever since she first thought about going to Hogwarts she had thought herself and Harry would just end up in the same house, whatever one it was. They were inseparable in her mind and not even the Sorting Hat was going to change that.

"I don't know", she admitted. Harry looked mildly surprised by her answer. Lyra seemed like the kind of person who would have her mind firmly set in a matter like this.

"Really?" he asked

"Yeah", she answered with a slight scowl, "D'you have any idea?"

"I'm gonna be a Gryffindor!" Harry said energetically, "I don't think I'd fit anywhere else, you know?"

Now that Lyra thought about it, she couldn't imagine Harry wearing any other Hogwarts crest on his uniform. He seemed almost predestined for that house. Not that he didn't more then fill the criteria for the other four houses, because trust her, he did. It would seem like he would be a tough choice, but Lyra couldn't see anything else for him. It just felt wrong to imagine him wearing a Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff or Slytherin uniform.

"Well I hope I'm in there with you", she said throwing him an easy smile.

"Anyway, what house team is gonna win this year?" Harry effortlessly changed the subject to a much more welcome one, thus throwing the thought of possible separation from their minds.

"You know I don't have a clue about anything to do with Quidditch", Lyra said rolling her eyes at him exasperatedly

"So" Harry said defensively, "It's about time you did. Especially since I've got to train you into a decent beater so you can try out with me next year"

Lyra stared at him for a moment with wide eyes, "What put that into your head?" she asked

"Well, you've got brilliant aim - and you can throw one hell of a punch. You'd make a good beater with some training"

"You do know that I'm afraid of flying right?" Lyra asked through gritted teeth. She hated admitting that she was afraid of anything, but flying…that was just something she'd never be able to get over.

"You wouldn't be if you tried it properly", he told her and she was saved from having to come up with an excuse by the compartment door sliding open to reveal Tonks in all her pink haired and ripped jeans-ed glory.

"Wotcher kiddies", she joked as she waltzed in and moved Lyra's feet so she could sit down.

"Hey!" Lyra protested indignantly but all Tonks did was stick her tongue out at her. As she did that Lyra noticed something odd about it. "You got your tongue pierced!" she exclaimed pointing at Tonks' now closed mouth.

"What?" Harry asked looking shocked, "Why would you do that?"

"Oh, my dear, innocent Harry…to piss off my mother", she responded simply, "And it looks bloody brilliant, doesn't it?" she stuck her tongue out fully this time to show them the simple metal stud that was now imbeded in her tongue.

"Yeah", Lyra agreed enthusiastically. Harry made sort of a grimace at the piercing and didn't say anything.

While Lyra quite liked the piercings Tonks always talked to her about getting, Harry didn't see the point in them really. Especially the facial piercings, he found them quite strange and unnecessary. Lyra on the other hand thought they looked different, individual and really cool.

Tonks stayed and chatted with them for a short while before she left again to go catch up with her seventh year friends. This left Harry and Lyra on their own again, without much to do in such a small space. So Lyra pulled out a deck of exploding snap cards to keep them entertained for a good part of the journey.

They didn't get very far into their game before they were interrupted though. The compartment door slid open once again. This time, it wasn't Tonks that came through the door. It was a pair of identical tall red-headed boys. What was weirder then their sudden entrance was the fact that once they were in the door they slid it shut behind them quickly and ducked down, as if they were hiding from something.

Lyra and Harry stared at the two strange boys for a full minute before something happened. They heard angry footsteps thundering down the corridor and saw a group of five big, beefy guys in Slytherin uniforms dash past. Lyra guessed they were the ones the two boys had been hiding from because when they'd left the red-headed twins stood up again and breathed a sigh of relief.

"Who're you?" they asked when they turned around and spotted Lyra and Harry who were still holding hands of cards.

They, by the looks of it, were only just now realising that the compartment they ducked into to hide in wasn't empty. The pile of snap cards in between them chose that moment to explode and take all four of them by surprise.

"Alright then", one of them said after another short moment of silence looking at the charred remains of the cards.

"Who're you two?" the second one asked again

"I'm Harry, that's Lyra", Harry introduced them, "Who're you, and why were you running from a bunch of mean looking seventh years?"

"Fred and George Weasley", they both said together.

"And we may have –", the first twin started

"Possibly, but they have no proof –", the second twin continued

"Set off a few dungbombs –",

"In the bunch of wankers' compartment".

Harry and Lyra looked at the twins, Fred and George apparently, then back at each other, and then back at the twins. They burst out laughing.

"Nice one", Lyra commented through her laughter and said to Harry, "We should've done something like that!"

"Yeah", he agreed, "It would've been great"

"Wait a second", one of the twins said and the two first years looked back up at them, "You were planning to pull a prank on the seventh years?" he asked disbelief saturating his tone.

"Well not specifically seventh years", Harry answered with a shrug.

"The plan was more like anyone who got in the way really", Lyra finished.

"Well Fred", George said, "I think this is gonna be the start of a wonderful friendship"

"I think so too George", Fred said with a nod and matching devious smirks working their way up each of their faces.

Lyra heard thundering coming back down the hall and pulled the twins down again just as the same group of Slytherins ran past again. She faintly heard one of them ask "where are those damn Weasleys gone now?" before then ran off again to continue looking for the twins somewhere else.

"Wanna hide out of here for a while?" Lyra asked the twins.

They shared a quick look and shrugged, "Why not?".

So the twins stayed with Harry and Lyra for a while and invited themselves into their game of exploding snap. Soon enough the conversation was turned to pranks and the school teachers. Harry, being the wonderful brother that he was, brought up Lyra and Tonks' prank gone wrong from a while back.

"You got Snape in the face?" George asked laughing uncontrollably

"Yeah, we didn't even plan to. He just came through before Moony", Lyra told them shaking her head, "I thought he was gonna kill us"

"Wait, who's 'Moony'?" Fred asked

"Our uncle Remus", Harry answered, "It's what we call him most of the time, it was his nickname when he was at Hogwarts"

Fred and George gaped at them for a minute in awe.

"Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs" they said in unison. Harry and Lyra were shocked. The vast majority of the students wouldn't, or shouldn't, have a clue who the marauders were. It would only be the teachers who'd remember or know about the biggest group of Hogwarts troublemakers.

"How d'you two know about the marauders?" Harry asked

"We found something in Filch's office in our first year", Fred told them.

"Made us the pranksters we were today, it did", George added.

"Filch brought us into his office to give out to us about a bit of an incident with fireworks", Fred continued.

"And we saw a drawer full of confiscated 'dangerous' stuff", George told them.

"So I set off a distraction behind Filch's desk",

"And I nicked this", George finished pulling out what looked like a plain old piece of parchment.

"We knew it had to be more than just a piece of parchment if Filch confiscated it", Fred told them.

"We think he suspected what it was, but we don't think he ever figured out how to use it", George said and pulled out his wand. Lyra gasped.

"This little beauty has taught us more than nearly all the teachers in the school", Fred commented offhandedly. Lyra later found out that it was Remus that he left out of that statement, funnily enough.

"You found it!" she exclaimed goggling at it.

"How'd it end up in Filch's office?" Harry asked.

"We don't know", Fred admitted, "He probably took it off them sometime near the end of their wonderful career"

"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good", George whispered and tapped the parchment with his wand. When he did a map of a magnificent castle winded its way onto the once blank sheet.

It read in bold green lettering:

_Messrs Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs_

_Purveyors of Aid to Magical Mischief-Makers are proud to present_

_THE MARAUDER'S MAP_

"You actually found it", Harry said in awe, "I can't believe it, I can't wait to tell uncle Padfoot. He'll be delighted"

"Padfoot's your uncle too?" Fred asked.

"Are they all related or something?" George asked them with a confused frown.

"No", Lyra answered, "The four of them were best friends back then, practically brothers, so we call them our uncles", she explained.

"You're the marauder's kids?" they asked, Lyra and Harry nodded, "wicked".

"Who were they?" George wondered out loud. Harry and Lyra shared a look before nodding. They decided that since they were fellow marauders in the making, they could tell the twins.

"Wormtail was Peter Pettigrew", Harry said with hate colouring his tone.

Pettigrew was the one who betrayed his parents to Voldemort; Harry has wanted to have him thrown into Azkaban ever since he found out. The Aurors are still looking for him, but they've still got no leads.

"Moony is Remus Lupin", Lyra said, "Yup, that's the DADA professor Lupin" she nodded and chuckled to herself at the look of pure awe on their faces. They'd had no idea that their DADA professor was the legendary prankster that was one of their role models.

"Prongs was James Potter, my dad", Harry said with a proud smile.

"Wait, that means your Harry Potter", Fred said sitting up ram rod straight all of a sudden, "_The_ Harry Potter, as in the _Boy Who Lived_?"

George looked over Harry with a new observant scrutiny, finally bothering to take notice of the perfectly shaped lightning bolt scar on Harry's forehead.

"Yeah", Harry started awkwardly, "I'd rather not talk about that though"

"Alright", George shrugged.

"We'll get the dirt about Moldyshorts out of you soon enough", Fred promised, Lyra laughed at the nickname and even Harry let a small smile grace his face at it.

"So was Padfoot?" George changed the subject.

"Sirius Black" Lyra answered casually with a chuckle, still stretched out regally on the her seat, "The Auror captain"

"No way", Fred said grinning, "How'd they let him into the Aurors?"

"Cause he's the best they've got", Harry told them, "You should see him duel, it's amazing".

"Yeah, and you should've seen aunt Min's face when she realised that dad and James' kids were gonna be starting Hogwarts together this year", Lyra laughed at the memory that she would never forget.

"Aunt Min?" George repeated looking confused.

"You talking about McGonagall?" Fred asked.

"Yeah, she's Lyra's grandaunt", Harry answered carelessly.

The twins snorted, "Well she must've been delighted when she found out that one of the infamous marauders was dating her niece" Fred remarked.

"I suppose she would've been alright" Lyra agreed jokingly. A question suddenly came into her head that she hadn't thought to ask the twins before, "What house are you two in?"

She had only asked because she'd made up her mind about where she wanted go. She was going wherever Harry and the twins were. The couple of hours they'd spent talking together had just solidified her mind on the fact that the twins were right earlier. They really would get along as chaotically as her dad and his friends in school. And that's exactly what she wanted.

"Gryffindor", they answered together.

"Everyone in our family has been", George told them, "Our younger brother is a first year too, he's freaking out that he mightn't be put there too".

"But not everyone in a family goes to the same house. We Weasleys are weird in the way that all of us have been" Fred continued.

As they continued to talk and joke and get to know each other better the landscape outside turned from houses and neat suburban garden to tidy fields filled with sheep and cattle. The sky had gotten brighter and less dreary looking in the time since they had left the station.

Their conversation about what the best way to annoy Filch was - they were caught between kicking Mrs Norris and trailing mud all over the floors - was interrupted by a great clattering coming from outside in the hallway. The door was slid open by a plump smiling witch.

"Anything from the trolley dears?" she asked.

Lyra then saw the trolley stuffed to bursting point with about half the sweets she could ever want. She leapt up from her seat and snatched all the chocolate frogs she could carry, along with a few cauldron cakes and liquorish wands.

Harry shook his head at her when he saw she'd gotten so many chocolate frogs. "You do realise that Min'll freak if she finds all those right?"

"What she doesn't know won't hurt her, and I'm still missing Agrippa" she retorted.

"Moony's definitely passed along his chocolate obsession" Harry said under his breath, Lyra just stuck her tongue out at him and paid for her mountain of sweets.

"I'm guessing you two're hungry", Fred said looking at the pile of junk food Lyra and Harry dumped onto their seats.

"Bloody starving", Harry answered, "Want some?" he asked spying the lumpy sandwiches the twins had taken out.

"No thanks, we're all set", George replied waving a package of sandwiches.

"Go on", Lyra urged, "Have a pasty" she goaded, picking one up off the seat and tossing it to the closest one of them. George caught it easily with his Quidditch honed reflexes. He rolled his eyes.

"Eat it, or d'you wanna start a food fight?" Harry threatened picking up one of Lyra's cauldron cakes mock seriously.

"Alright, we surrender", Fred said dramatically, acting like Harry was threatening him with the killing curse rather than a cauldron cake.

"Ha ha!" Harry exclaimed.

"Victory!" Lyra cheered giving him a high five.

"So", Harry said, turning to the twins as he ripped open a chocolate frog, "What's it like playing on the house team?".

He listened to everything Fred and George had to say about the Gryffindor Quidditch team with rapt interest. He was totally absorbed in every story they had to tell about the matches, and about their obsessive captain, Oliver Wood. Lyra's attention however, wandered away from the conversation quite quickly.

She opened another chocolate frog and tossed the empty packet into the pile steadily building on the floor. She munched on the chocolate figure and took a look at the card she'd gotten. Lyra hoped that she didn't get Elfric the Evil again. She had about seven of him. Thankfully, she didn't get him.

When she picked up the card a face adorned with half moon glasses and a long, slivery beard stared back at her serenely. It was Albus Dumbledore. He was one of the only ones that she didn't have yet. She didn't really care about collecting him as much as Agrippa though, because she saw him often enough in person. Pleased with her luck all the same, and flipped over the card to read the back like she always did, even though she knew exactly why Dumbledore was famous.

_ Albus Dumbledore, currently Headmaster of Hogwarts,_

_ Considered by many the greatest wizard of modern times,_

_ Professor Dumbledore is particularly famous for his defeat of the dark wizard Grindelwald in 1945, _

_ For his defeat of the rogue demoness Alal in 1984, _

_ For the discovery of the twelve uses of dragon's blood,_

_ And his work on alchemy with his partner, Nicolas Flamel_

_ Professor Dumbledore enjoys chamber music and tenpin blowing._

She read the fourth line three or four times over.

Alal.

Alal.

So that was the name of the demoness who attacked her, who killed her mother. The rest of the Wizarding world knew of her defeat at the hands of Dumbledore but no one_ bothered_ to tell her the demon's name.

It was Alal.

_She_ was Alal.

She could now put a name to the deadly pale face that haunted her nightmares.

_Destroyer_.

How she knew what the demon's name meant she didn't know. It just felt right. Like a piece of a jigsaw falling into place.

As she read the name again she remembered Ollivander saying something to her as she paid for her wand. The hair and blood of a high-priestess. The Destroyer.

Was he talking about Alal?

Did the hair and blood in her wand's core belong to the same demoness that tried to kill her?

Lyra had to put away the card; she couldn't look at it anymore.

Instead Lyra started to listen to what the boys were talking about again. It was a much simpler topic to think about. And simple was what Lyra wanted at the minute. She could mull over the disastrous consequences of her run in with Alal when she was alone.


	8. A Raven, a Snake, a Badger, or a Lion?

**Lyra Black and the Philosopher's Stone**

**A/N - **Hello again, I'm back with the latest instalment of the Lyra Black Series! As usual I'd like to thank my beta hpfan224, and everyone who's read and those of you who've reviewed.

**Chapter 8 – A Raven, a Snake, a Badger, or a Lion?**

While eating their way through the, now nearly depleted, pile of sweets – the sandwiches lay forgotten somewhere in the compartment – Lyra came across a box of Bertie Bott's every flavour beans. She liked them because you never knew what you were going to get. Her uncle Remus hated them for that very same reason. She picked up the box and took out an innocent looking yellow one. George made a disgusted noise and grimaced at the box.

"What's wrong with you?" she asked amused.

"I got a bogey flavoured one once" he answered and she made a face at the box then turned back to George.

"Really?" she asked disbelievingly.

"Yeah" he insisted.

"Was it yellow?" she asked waving the bean she was holding around for him to see properly.

"No" he answered and before he could say anything else to her she popped the bean into her mouth and bit into it. Unluckily for her it was lemon flavoured and really, really sour. Her face scrunched up momentarily and she let out a small gasp after the bitterness at last faded away.

"Lemon" she said and the three boys nodded in understanding and said "Oh".

After that they all started picking out a bean and daring one of the others to eat it. Lyra ended up with having the lemon one, peppermint, haggis, tea, toast, apricot, lime, and was daring enough to take a frightening looking grey one that no one else would even touch.

"Go on then Ly" Harry said as she picked up the bean, "I wish I had a camera" he whispered to Fred and George. She shot him dirty look, bit into the bean and almost immediately exploded into a violent fit of coughing. When she was finally able to calm herself down she said only one word, but it was enough.

"Pepper".

The other three burst into laughter. Harry was clutching his side he was cackling so hard. Lyra joined them as soon as she was finished coughing.

"Oh Merlin" Fred said taking a deep breath.

"Really glad I didn't eat that now" George said to his twin.

"Oh shag off" Lyra retorted.

A little while later Lyra looked out the window to find that the sky outside had changed completely while they'd been talking and messing around. Instead of the pale greyish-blue it had been when they left the station it was now a deep midnight blue. It was only visible over the tops of the tall trees that made up the wild expanse of, seemingly never-ending, forest they were almost flying past and the peaks of the jagged mountains that sprung up here and there.

"It's getting pretty late" Harry said noticing Lyra looking out the window, "We should probably get changed into our robes soon".

"We probably should" Lyra agreed, but turned back around and started up one a new topic, a plan of hers to break into Snape's office and paint it pink. As you could probably guess that distracted them for quite a while. Their main problem was getting into Snape's office to do it; outside of classes he didn't leave it much.

The four of them were left pretty much alone for the entire train journey. Lyra guessed that it was because of the twins' reputation. Whenever anyone approached the door, usually with a curious expression, they scampered away pretty quickly when they caught sight of the red-heads. This meant they were only interrupted when a voice echoed through the train saying,

"We will be reaching Hogwarts in five minutes' time. Please leave your luggage on the train, it will be taken to the school separately".

Lyra's stomach lurched with sudden nervousness at hearing that. Talking with Harry and the twins all day had put her at ease with the usual worry involved with starting school, but now…not so much. She looked over to Harry to see if he was alright and saw that he was a little paler then normal. But he was keeping up quite a calm exterior. Lyra knew that he was starting to freak out though, just like she was.

She took out her plain black school robe and slipped it on. It did take her a minute or two to fight her way through it but she got there eventually. When she did Lyra took another look out the window to see if they were at Hogsmeade yet. It turned out that the sky was so dark now that the window turned into a giant mirror. All she could see was her own reflection staring back at her and her friends in the background.

She grimaced. The uniform made her look pale as a ghost. It was something she didn't like because her skin now looked pale enough to remind her of someone she'd rather not think about. So she turned away from the window and made up her mind that she would try to look in as few mirrors as possible while wearing the awful uniform.

They all stuffed their pockets with the remains of their pile of sweets and made their way out into the crowd packed into the narrow corridor. Luckily for them they were at the very back and right next to a door nearly everyone else had totally forgotten about.

The train started to slow right down and at last stopped with a jerk. Some people stumbled into the walls – the round faced boy Lyra had seen arguing with his gran was one of them. The rest of the students pushed their way out the doors and onto the platform.

Lyra, Harry and the twins easily slipped out the back door and hopped off the train unnoticed. Lyra found herself on a tiny, dark platform with cold air lightly whipping at her face. She shivered a little in the frigid night air and looked around the platform again. She saw a lamp come bobbing above the heads of the other students and heard a familiar voice calling out over the noise of the kids and teenagers.

"Firs'-years! Firs'-years over here!" it was Hagrid calling all the first years over to take them to the castle.

"Well we'll see you later then" George said cheerfully.

"Good luck with the Sorting" Fred said clapping each of them on the shoulder, "You know what it is don't you? Cause little Ronniekins doesn't" he and George both laughed loudly.

"We told him he'd have to wrestle a troll" George explained.

"So gullible" Fred said

They left Lyra and Harry to join the other first years then. The students from second year upwards went to the castle in carriages that were pulled along by nothing. At least that's what Lyra's dad told her. The first years went across the Black Lake every year on a fleet of boats led by Hagrid.

"Firs'-years!" Hagrid was still calling when Lyra and Harry made their way through the crowd up to him, "Well hullo, Harry, Lyra. Not gotten into any trouble yet I hope".

"Not yet" Harry answered casually.

"Any more firs'-years? No – well c'mon, follow me. Mind yer step, now!" Hagrid led them to slip and stumble their way down a steep narrow path.

It was so dark on either side of the walkway that Lyra couldn't see anything but the barley distinguishable outlines of the trees that made up the thick forest surrounding the school. Nobody spoke much as they walked – more like slid – down the slope. One boy kept sniffling as if he had a cold, so it wasn't totally quiet.

"Yeh'll get yer firs' sight o' Hogwarts in a sec" Hagrid announced and the group around Harry and Lyra started standing on tip toe and craning their necks to try and see the castle. Lyra and Harry had been to the castle numerous times before so the urgency to catch a glimpse of it was lost on them.

"Jus' round this bend here" the gamekeeper told them and there was a loud "Oooooh!" from most of the first years.

The narrow path had opened suddenly on the edge of the great Black Lake. And there was Hogwarts castle, perched atop a towering mountain on the other side of the glassy smooth water. Its windows sparkled in the dark starry sky and its many turrets and towers reached for the heavens. Even with the amount of times Lyra had seen the castle and run amuck around its halls, the beauty of the magnificent building was not lost on her. She didn't' think it ever would be. It was truly beautiful.

"No more'n four to a boat!" Hagrid warned them all, bringing Lyra's attention back to where she was. He was pointing to the small fleet of little row boats lined up in the water at the shore of the lake.

Lyra and Harry quickly hopped into the boat nearest to them and were followed in by a girl with bushy hair and a bright smile full of excitement glowing on her face, and the round faced boy from the platform. Looking around at them and the other first years clambering into the boats Lyra was struck with a sudden realisation. Her and Harry didn't know a single person in their year. That couldn't be very good.

She glanced around again and spotted a head of bright red hair attached to a face with a smattering of freckles. He looked a hell of a lot like the twins, so Lyra guessed he was their brother, Ron. She also recalled that back on the platform the boy's grandmother had called him Neville when she was giving out to him. So that was more then likely his name. At least she knew the names of two of their other classmates. Hopefully that would get them through until she heard them all at the Sorting – when that would be though, she had no idea.

"Everyone in?" Hagrid, who had an entire boat to himself, shouted across to them. They all nodded. "Right then – FORWARD!"

With that the fleet of little boats moved forward as one through the calm waters. Everyone was silent and staring at the amazing castle that was high overhead. It loomed over them gracefully as the glided across the lake closer and closer to the cliff on which it stood strong.

"Heads down!" Hagrid yelled in warning as the first few boats reached the cliff face. They all quickly bent their heads as the small boats carried them through a wall of ivy that concealed a wide opening in the rock.

They were then taken down a long dark tunnel which looked to be taking them right under the castle itself. Lyra had never been down there before. They only stopped when they reached a kind of under-ground harbour. The boats stopped along a rocky port and they scrambled out onto the slippery rocks and pebbles. Hagrid stayed behind them momentarily to check that no one had left anything after them in the boats.

"Oy, you there!" he called out of nowhere, "Is this yer toad?"

"Trevor!" the boy Lyra supposed was called Neville cried blissfully, holding out his hands to Hagrid. The toad was plopped into them and Neville clutched onto him tightly to try and prevent him attempting another escape. From what little Lyra had heard about the boy and this toad she could guess that it was a regular occurrence.

Once Neville was reunited with his toad Lyra, Harry and the rest of the first years followed Hagrid once again. And again, none of them knew where he was taking them this time. He took them up a dark rocky passageway; Lyra could hardly make out his massive frame loping along, until they finally emerged on to the neatly cut, damp grass right in the shadow of the castle. They kept walking right up to the flight of stone steps that led to the immense, heavy, oak front door of the school. The first years and Hagrid crowded around it, most of them with either eager of slightly nauseous expressions.

"Everyone here?" Hagrid asked just to be sure, you never know, "You there, yeh still got yer toad?"

With that Hagrid raised one of his giant fists and knocked on the thick door three times. The door was swung open almost right away by Minerva. She stood there tall and authoritative, in her emerald green robes, a pointed witch's hat on her head with her square glasses placed over her yes. She looked as stern as she always did when inside the castle walls.

"I've got the firs'-years, professor McGonagall" Hagrid announced proudly and Lyra's aunt nodded her head at him.

"Thank you Hagrid, I'll take them from here".

She pulled the door open wide and lead the first years into the Entrance Hall, it was so big you could've fit a whole house in it. The old stone walls were lit with flaming torches, they looked a lot like the ones they had in Gringots, and the ceiling was far too high up to make out properly. The grand marble staircase that led to the upper floors faced them.

As she followed her aunt across the flagged stone floor with the rest of the first years Lyra could hear the drone of hundreds of voices coming from a doorway to her right, the Great Hall. She guessed that all the other students were starting to get pretty bored waiting for the Sorting to start so they could get on with the feast, she knew she would be.

Instead of taking them into the Great Hall where the rest of the school was Min led them into a much smaller chamber off to the left of the hall. That kind of threw Lyra off. _Weren't they meant to start with the Sorting as soon as we got here?_ She thought to herself.

"Welcome to Hogwarts" Min started, looking around at all the first years as if daring them to talk and see what she'd do, "The start of term feast will begin shortly, but before that you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting Ceremony is very important because while you are at Hogwarts your house will be like your family within the school. You will have classes with your house, sleep in your house dormitories and spend your free time in your house common room".

Lyra knew that her aunt didn't stop talking there, but she knew all of this already so she stopped listening completely. Harry would nudge her when it was time for them to be sorted. Some people on the other hand were listening to Min with rapt attention. The bushy haired girl that she and Harry shared a boat with was one of them Lyra noticed.

Some time later Harry gave Lyra a harsh jab in the ribs with his scrawny, pointy elbow and she snapped out of her daydream about throwing dungbombs at Snape just in time to hear her aunt say,

"The Sorting Ceremony will begin in a few minutes. I will return when we are ready for you" and she then left the first years to their own devices. She wouldn't have done so if she wasn't sure that they were scared shitless enough not to even try moving a muscle.

Lyra looked around at her classmates and saw that most of them were standing far closer to each other then they normally would be, and that they shot nervous glances around them regularly. She had to stop herself laughing at how ridiculous they looked.

As she observed the other first years she noticed that the pale haired prick from Madame Malkin's was one of the only ones of them who looked at all comfortable where they were. She also noticed that he and the two troll like boys either side of him were the only ones moving. And they were heading right for her and Harry. _Shit_.

He came to a stop in front of them, looking at Harry a lot more interestedly then he had in the robe shop.

"Is it true?" he asked, "They were saying all down the train that Harry Potter was staring with us. So it's you, is it?"

Lyra had to hand it to him. He had balls.

She shot one last look at the kids around them to see that they were all watching the exchange with unconcealed interest. Looks like they all wanted to know, but this guy was the only one willing to come right out and ask. That sort of redeemed him a little in Lyra's eyes.

"Yes" Harry answered, but he wasn't looking at the pale haired boy. He was more preoccupied with the two that were standing either side of him like rather dense looking body guards.

"Oh, this is Crabbe and Goyle" the boy said with a casual wave of his hand, seeing where Harry was looking. "And I'm Draco Malfoy"

Malfoy. That name was familiar. Where had she heard that before? Malfoy….oh shit. Please not _those_ Malfoys. This _wasn't_ going to end well. How _hadn't_ she seen the resemblance before?

"Thanks for the introduction Draco" Lyra interrupted causing the tree boys to look down at her instead of at Harry, "but what d'you want?"

"I wasn't talking to you Black" he snapped and Lyra sniggered at him.

"Finally realised who you're dealing with then Draco?" she asked with a grin.

She decided then that she wasn't going to call him anything else from now on. She knew by the way his eye twitched ever so slightly when she called himby his first name that it would annoy the hell out of him.

Before they could do anything else Minerva, with her impeccable timing, came back. She swung the door open and said sternly, "Move along now. The Sorting Ceremony is about to begin" the first years all jumped at her sudden, unexpected reappearance.

She gave Lyra, Harry, Draco and the two walking mountains a warning look before she continued, "Now form a line", she told them, "and follow after me"

Lyra shot Draco a last dirty look and got in line after Harry. Minerva led them all out of the small chamber and back across the flagged stone floor of the Entrance Hall. Almost all the first years were wearing terrified expressions and walked as if they were weighed down with big blocks of lead. If you looked at them you'd swear they were being brought to their deaths, not a Sorting.

Lyra didn't understand their worry; all they'd have to do is try on an old hat. She was feeling a little anxious, but it was nothing really that bad. In her mind they were all overreacting. Harry turned around to her, looking a little uneasy but grinned at her anyway.

She smirked back and whispered, "Bet you three galleons someone'll fall flat on their face before the feast".

"You're on" he said back.

They came to the double doors to the Great Hall just then. Lyra hadn't ever been in the Great Hall before, but she had been told about it many times by her dad, uncle and aunts. The real thing was a thousand times better then it seemed in any of their long hall was lit by thousands of glowing candles suspended in mid air above the four house tables and along the staff at the other end of the room. All of the tables were set with glittering gold plates, cutlery and goblets.

Sitting at the staff table looking down at the new students were the professors. Lyra knew of a good few of them – her dad had told her about them – but she'd never seen a lot of them of them in particular caught her attention. It was a man wearing a weird, large purple turban. She soon found something more interesting though, and forgot about him.

Minerva now had them form a line in front of the staff table and face the hall full of students. Hundreds of faces stared back at them with, for the most part, very uninterested expressions. Some were mildly interested, and were giving the thumbs up to a younger sibling. They were probably the only ones genuinely interested.

Mostly to have something to do other then have a staring contest with the rest of Hogwarts Lyra looked up at the ceiling. She craned her neck to get a good look up at it. It was enchanted to look like the sky outside, and it really was as captivating as Remus had told her. That night it was shrouded in the velvety black of the sky outside and was dotted with twinkling stars that were winking down at her. The crescent moon shone down on them all hauntingly.

Lyra only looked away from the ceiling when she realised that the whole hall had gone silent. She watched as Minerva placed a four legged stool in front of them and left a frayed old hat on top of it. Everyone was now watching at the hat, so she looked at it too, wondering what they were expecting it to do. For a few seconds nothing happened, there was just total silence.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, the hat twitched. Then a big rip opened just above its brim that looked sort of like a mouth, and the hat began to sing.

"_Oh, you may not think I'm pretty,_

_But don't judge on what you see,_

_I'll eat myself if you can find_

_A smarter hat then me. _

_You can keep your bowlers black, _

_Your top hats sleek and tall,_

_For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat_

_And I can cap them all. _

_There's nothing hidden in your head_

_The Sorting Hat can't see,_

_So try me on and I will tell you_

_Where you ought to be. _

_You might belong in Gryffindor,_

_Where dwell the brave at heart,_

_Their daring, nerve and chivalry_

_Set Gryffindors apart;_

_You might belong in Hufflepuff,_

_Where they are just and loyal,_

_Those patient Huffelpuffs are true and unafraid of toil;_

_Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,_

_If you've a ready mind,_

_Where those of wit and learning,_

_Will always find their kind;_

_Or perhaps in Slytherin_

_You'll make your real friends,_

_Those cunning folk use any means_

_To achieve their ends. _

_So put me on! Don't be afraid!_

_And don't get in a flap!_

_You're in safe hands (though I have none)_

_For I'm a Thinking Cap!"_

As the hat finally finished its song the whole hall burst into polite applause. The tattered old hat bowed to each of the four house tables and became still once again. A thought suddenly entered Lyra's mind _if I brought that to Privet Drive Petunia would have a stroke_. She had to bite back a laugh at the mental image of what Petunia's face would look like if the woman ever laid eyes on the scruffy Sorting Hat. Poor hat.

Lyra heard someone exclaim, "So we've just to try on the hat?" sounding delighted. The vast majority of the first years surrounding her let out a heavy sigh of relief. She rolled her eyes at them. What else did they think the teachers would make them do?

The only problem Lyra could see was that she thought the hat was asking a bit much from her at the minute. She didn't feel brave, cunning, smart, patient, or any of the above at the moment. If only the damn hat mentioned a house for people who wanted to go back and jump in the Black Lake. That would've been the perfect house for her.

Lyra was trying so hard to hold back the very uncharacteristic blush that wanted to flood her cheeks at the feeling of hundreds of eyes staring at her. She didn't think she could much longer. _Would aunt Min hurry the hell up?_

Just after Lyra desperately thought that Minerva stepped forward holding a long roll of parchment. She turned to the first years, "When I call your name, put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted" she instructed them and started with, "Abbot, Hannah".

A girl with a pink face and long blond pigtails stepped forward when her name was called and stumbled her way to the stool. She shakily put on the hat – it then fell down all the way over her eyes – and sat on the stool. She looked like she was trying not to shake with nerves. After a brief moment's pause the hat shouted, "HUFFELPUFF!"

The people sitting at the table on the right cheered loudly and clapped as Hannah went to sit down with her new housemates. Lyra saw the ghost of a little monk that was seated among the students waving at her cheerfully.

"Black, Lyra!" Minerva called her name and Lyra blinked in surprise. She didn't expect her name to be the bloody second one called out. She walked up to the stool and took the hat.

Whispers broke out across the hall instantly. Lyra tried her best to ignore their reaction to her. She knew her dad had a reputation as a trouble maker, she knew a lot of her family were known as supporters of Voldemort, and as pureblood supremacists…but she didn't know people would be so interested in her so long after all that happened.

"_Black_?" someone asked, not very quietly.

"One of _those_ Blacks?" another exclaimed.

She sat down and the hat slid over her head and over her eyes, just like it did to Hannah, only it covered nearly her entire face. The very last thing she saw was loads of faces staring at her with a lot more interest then they'd been showing earlier. Then she was plunged into total darkness.

She heard a whisper of a breathy voice in her head out of nowhere and she nearly jumped. _Hmm…I was wondering when I'd see a Black again the voice said in her ear_.

_Now…where to put you?_ What she now realised was the hat spoke again after a pause.

_What a mind….blunt….but devious, no one would expect it…very determined…oh yes, yes…you would do very well in Slytherin…but…there's such nerve, and pure recklessness…_

It trailed off and there was another silence that lasted for what could've been seconds, or minutes, Lyra couldn't tell. Then it spoke again.

_There's power, yes, definitely powerful…_

The hat spoke more to itself now then to Lyra. She felt like she was listening in on a conversation rather then taking part in one. Lyra gripped the sides of the stool with her hands and focused on not swinging her legs that didn't even nearly reach the ground.

_Clever…very bright…talented…but Ravenclaw just won't do…_

Lyra was starting to get very impatient by now. _Oh, just hurry the bloody hell up!_ She thought at it angrily.

_Wait…what's this?_ The hat spoke again.

_What's what?_ Lyra asked the hat confused. She _thought_ she heard the hat laughing at her. The hat didn't answer her, but Lyra could just imagine it beaming with joy. And when it spoke again it sounded like Christmas had come early.

_So unaware._ It said to her.

_Unaware of what?_ She asked it. _What d'you mean?_

_Alal_, whispered the hat and left it at that for another pause that lasted Lyra didn't know how long.

_Your destiny, young Black, lies in…_ She heard it bellow the next word out so the whole hall could hear it, "GRYFFINDOR!"

There was a second of total silence where no one did anything. That is until Lyra took the hat off and put it back down on the stool. As she walked towards the Gryffindor table she discreetly looked over at her aunt. Minerva was struggling to hold back an expression of delight and pride.

She grinned to herself and the table on the far left exploded with cheers and applause, much louder then the Huffelpuffs were. She strode over to the Gryffindor table with the confidence she learned how to show from watching her aunt Andy and Tonks, even if she didn't feel quite so secure herself. Lyra heard the twins wolf-whistling at her and winked back at them.

A few of the Gryffindors who weren't afraid of her because of her status as the heir to the House of Black congratulated her. She slid into the seat next to Fred and told the both of them to shut up. Lyra stole a quick glance up at the staff table in time to see Remus give her a barley noticable thumbs up and a smile.

After her "Bones, Susan" was called forward. The hat soon declared her to be another "HUFFLEPUFF!" and the table on the right cheered again as Susan practically ran off to sit with Hannah.

Next it was "Boot, Terry" who was decided to be a "RAVENCLAW!" The table next to Lyra's clapped this time, but in a much more dignified way then the Huffelpuffs and Gryffindors had, Lyra noticed. _The hat was right,_ Lyra had to allow, _I probably would've gone mad there_.

The next girl called out, "Brocklehurst, Mandy", went to Ravenclaw too, but the next Gryffindor was soon called out. "Brown, Lavender" was the one to become the second new Gryffindor. And this time Lyra got in on the cheering for the hell of it as her table erupted again.

The year's first Slytherin was soon found to be "Bulstrode, Millicent". Maybe it was all Lyra had been told about Slytherin house by her father, who admittedly was more then a little biased on the issue, but they seemed like an unpleasant lot, most of them anyway.

"Finch-Fletchley, Justin" was up next. The hat had barley settled on his head properly when it yelled out "HUFFLEPUFF!"

Lyra noticed as the sorting went on that sometimes that hat shouted out a house for the person almost as soon as it touched their head, like with that Justin guy. And other times it took a few minutes to decide. Like "Finnegan, Seamus", a sandy haired boy who stood near Harry and her in the line, sat on the stool for a full two minutes before the hat shouted "GRYFFINDOR!"

She wondered for a minute how long she was sitting there while the hat was talking to her.

"Granger, Hermione" was called out and Lyra looked back up in time to see a girl struggling to contain herself from running as she went forward and nearly shoved the hat onto her head. Lyra felt like laughing at the poor girl because, honestly, she looked hilarious.

After a few seconds the hat shouted out "GRYFFINDOR!" again and Hermione took it off looking delighted with herself. Lyra saw the boy she presumed was the twins' brother Ron groan as Hermione rushed over to sit with the other Gryffindor first years.

Lyra's table had once again burst into a loud mass of cheering when Hermione was sorted into their house. She was starting to get the feeling that her housemates liked any excuse to make noise. She had to admit though, it was kind of fun. Especially after seeing the disapproving look on Snape's face. It was pretty hard to tell, but Lyra was sure that she and the twins were making the most noise.

They found the winner to Harry and Lyra's bet from earlier a little while after Hermione Granger was sorted into Gryffindor. The boy who kept losing his toad was called up, "Longbottom, Neville" was his name. He fell over flat on his face on his way to the stool. Lyra tried not to laugh at the poor bloke and turned to look at Harry.

'I won' she mouthed at him.

All he mouthed back was, 'oh shut up'.

The hat took a long time trying to decide with Neville. Longer then anyone she'd seen called up yet. She asked Fred if he was taking longer then the rest, but George whispered across his twin that she took longer.

When the hat finally shouted, "GRYFFINDOR!" out to the rest of the hall Neville ran off to their table still wearing the hat. The cheers got a lot louder after that, if that was even possible, and he even got a light applause, and a few laughs, from the Huffelpuffs. He had to jog back up to the staff table amidst the gales of laughter echoing around the hall and give it to the next first year, "McDougal, Morag"

Lyra watched a little later as Draco swaggered – yes, he _actually_ swaggered – forward when his name was called with the air of confidence and elegance that was expected from someone of his blood and class. Their blood and class. It was something she absolutely hated. How everyone expected her to be so perfect just because her dad was an aristocrat.

Draco sat on the stool and Lyra thought back to their first meeting in Madame Malkin's. Then he said he'd end up in Slytherin, but only because his whole family was in that house. If she hadn't already developed a strong dislike fore him she would've said that he shouldn't count on that too much. It was useless to think about because the hat shouted out "SLYTHERIN!" anyway in less than thirty seconds.

Draco stood and walked, well _swaggered_ again, over to the Slytherin table in the same way he had to the stool. He had a grace anyone would die to have, Neville especially she guessed. That was kind of mean, but who cared, she wasn't going to say it out loud.

There weren't many people left to be sorted after Draco. It went "Moon", then "Nott", then "Parkinson" and a pair of twin girls, "Patil" and "Patil", followed by a girl called "Perks". Then at last, it was Harry's turn.

"Potter, Harry James" Minerva called out and Harry walked up to the stool, shooting Lyra his cheeky grin as he went, and slipped on the hat.

Whispers broke out across that hall once again, just as loud and rude as they were when it was Lyra's sorting. Everyone in the hall – even some Slytherins – was craning to get a good look at Harry. Lyra could even hear what a few of them were saying.

"Did she say _Potter_?"

"_The_ Harry Potter?"

And many more exclamations similar to them.

Lyra waited with the rest of the hall as Harry sat on the stool and had a silent conversation with the hat. The pause was only brief and the hat roared, "GRYFFINDOR!"

The Gryffindor table burst into the loudest, most roof raising cheers yet. Lyra and the twins cat called. Then much to both hers and Harry's amusement started they chanting loudly, "We got Potter! We got Potter!" over and over at the other houses until Harry reached them.

As he threw himself down into the seat next to Lyra Harry looked very relieved that it was all over, for him anyway. He just laughed at the twins antics and turned back to the high table and the students that were still to be sorted. She saw that there were only four people left to be sorted. Including the twins' brother, Ron.

"Riddle, Gabriel" was called out after Harry; he sat on the stool for, from what Lyra could guess, about as long as she had before he was declared a, "SLYTHERIN!"

She watched as the Slytherin table cheered and Gabriel walked over to sit next to Draco. He was a tiny bit below average height and quite thin. He had a walk that was relaxed and with a casual elegance, not quite a swagger like Draco's, but he had an air of power and confidence about him that, by the look of it, actually intimidated the people he passed on his way.

Despite the apparently huge intimidation factor, Gabriellooked like the poor misfortunate boy all the old ladys cooed over and pinced the cheeks off of. His creamy coloured skin, golden eyes, full lips and soft dark brown hair made him look very young, innocent, and rather sweet.

Lyra didn't know why she was paying so much attention to him and Draco, but as far as her cousin was concerned she guessed it had something to do with his eyes. There was nothing particularly unusual or spectacular about them, but the second she looked at them again they shocked her. Only because she was used to looking into the exact same ones every day, normally full of fun and familial love. They were almost exactly a carbon copy of her dad's eyes. Of her own eyes even. The only difference was their expression. They were superiour and haughty. She hadn't expected to find something about him that was so similar to her dad. It made it a lot more difficult to hate him.

She looked away again just as another person was called forward. "Turpin, Lisa" was sorted into Ravenclaw and then it was the twins' brother's turn. He looked pale green by now and Lyra almost felt sorry for him. Almost.

"Weasley, Ronald"

He put the hat on and after a pause of about a second it shouted out "GRYFFINDOR!" and their table burst into cheers yet again. Ron ran over and sat down next to Seamus and a boy she didn't catch the name of. The twins shouted their congratulations over at him, and who Lyra assumed was another one of their brothers shook his hand and commended him in the most pompous way he could think of.

"Zabini, Blaze" was then made the last Slytherin and that was the Sorting finished, at last. Minerva rolled up the scroll of names and carried the stool and the Sorting Hat away into a small chamber off to the side of the hall. Lyra had to refrain from cheering again, this time because they'd finally be able to eat! She was so glad she could nearly sing. She and the three boys stuffing their faces with all those chocolate frogs and cauldron cakes on the train seemed like ages ago now.

When Minerva came back and took her seat Dumbledore got to his feet and beamed around at all of the students sitting before him. He appeared as though noting on earth would've made him happier then standing in front of them at the start of a new year did.

From what Lyra knew of the, slightly crazy, incredibly wise and powerful old man she didn't doubt for a second that was the truth.

"Welcome!" he said, still beaming around at them all, "Welcome, to a new year at Hogwarts! But, before we begin our wonderful banquet, I would like to say a few words to you all. So, here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak! … Thank you!" with that he sat back down and turned to talk to Minerva who was sitting at his right hand.

Lyra laughed with Harry at Dumbledore's antics. They clapped and cheered for the beloved headmaster with everyone around them. _Mad as a Hatter_, she thought, looking up at the old wizard

Lyra looked down at the table for the first time and saw that now the gleaming gold dishes were piled high with more food then she'd ever seen in her life. Lyra had never gone without food, far from it really, but she'd never seen so many things she liked to eat all at one table. That was because Remus tried to keep them eating healthy, and always tried to stop them eating too much. But, looking at the feast set out in front of her, she had a feeling that while they were at Hogwarts Moony's healthy eating efforts were going to be ignored.

The table was stacked with roast beef, roast chicken, pork chops, lamb chops, sausages, burgers, steak pies, bacon, steak, boiled, roast and mashed potatoes, chops, Yorkshire puddings, peas and other vegetables – which Lyra was going to steer clear of – gravy, ketchup, HP sauce, and – for some unfathomable reason – mint humbugs. Lyra ignored the humbugs and didn't comment on them, since no one else found them so strange to have at the table. She decided to just go with it for now, she was too hungry to be too bothered by them, she could ask questions later.

Lyra and Harry piled their plates high – and ended up getting into a furious battle for the last Yorkshire pudding, Lyra won – then dug into their dinner like they'd been starved for months. When they were finished, in less time then anyone would've thought possible, the twins stared at them in disbelief.

"How'd you two eat all that?" George asked.

"You're too bloody small for it all to fit" Fred finished.

"Practise" Harry answered.

"We grew up with Sirius Black and Tonks" Lyra explained further.

As the mad rush to feed settled down Lyra decided to ask the twins something she'd been wondering for a while now. "How long was it into your first year that you both got your first detention?" she asked them. They looked off in thought for a moment then back at her.

"The end of our third week" Fred told them.

"How did you manage that?" Harry asked.

"Got caught sneaking into the Forbidden Forest" George answered casually, as if it was something that happened all the time. Lyra knew it probably was.

"We were hoping we'd broken the record" Fred told them.

"But turns out, we were nowhere near it" George said disappointedly.

"The record was the start of the second week" Fred finished.

"Who made it?" Harry asked, but Lyra had a feeling she knew the answer.

"Professor Lupin and your dads" George told them, sending a look of admiration at Remus up at the staff table. "It's no wonder all the teachers except him and McGonagall looked like they were gonna shit a brick when they saw you two being called out".

"You're gonna try and break their record aren't you?" Fred asked knowingly.

"What makes you think that?" Lyra asked back looking affronted.

"We're not going to try and break it" Harry told the twins, who looked genuinely shocked now.

"We're gonna blow it to pieces" Lyra clarified with an evil smile.

That's more like it" the twins said approvingly.

"We'll give them something to have nightmares about" Harry declared and Lyra nodded enthusiastically in agreement.

"I've already got the perfect plan".

"Fred, this is gonna be a brilliant year" George said to his twin.

"Oh yeah, McGonagall's really gonna have her work cut out for her this year".

When everyone had at last eaten their fill of dinner the golden plates cleaned themselves of every last crumb and scrap of food. Then the deserts appeared. The first thing that came into Lyra's head was CHOCOLATE! Remus' chocolate obsession _may_ be starting to rub off on her a little.

Lyra licked her lips eagerly as she looked around at the blocks of ice-cream in every flavour under the sun, treacle tarts, apple pies, jam doughnuts, trifle, strawberries, rice puddings, jelly and chocolate éclairs…any desert you could imagine was on that table. Lyra snatched a piece of chocolate cake and started devouring it just as Harry and the twins' conversation turned to their families.

"Well there's us, dad, mum, Bill – he's a curse-breaker for Gringots now – Charlie – he works with dragons in Romania" Fred counted off the people on his fingers.

"Percy, the prefect" George pointed over to the pompous boy from before.

"Ron, you saw him earlier" Fred said pointing at him next.

"And Ginny, she'll be starting next year".

"It's just us, uncle Moony and dad" Lyra told them once she was done with her cake, "My aunt Andy and Tonks sometimes stay with us too though".

Then, out of nowhere, Harry gasped and slapped his hand over his forehead. Lyra jumped at the sudden, unexpected action and looked over at Harry concernedly. "Harry, you okay?" she asked him quietly so no one around them could hear

"I think so" he said taking his hand away from his face, "My scar just hurt for no reason" he told her in the same quite way and Lyra didn't have a clue what to say to that.

"Who's that talking to Snape?" Harry asked the twins.

"Oh, that's Quirrell, teaches Muggle Studies, he's afraid of his own bloody shadow" Fred told them.

"He's a joke" George agreed.

Lyra wondered to herself why Harry would ask such a random question. But before she could ask he gave her their code look for 'later'.They had a system of looks worked out so they could communicate easily without being caught. They'd come up with the idea a little over a year ago and now they were very good at reading each other because of it.

It was only then that the last of the puddings and deserts all disappeared from the plates leaving them gleaming and spotlessly clean once more. Dumbledore got to his feet for the second time that night and the whole hall fell silent.


	9. With Love, the Marauders 20

**Lyra Black and the Philospher's Stone**

**A/N - **Hello again everyone! Before I move on to the next chapter I'd like to give the usual thanks to my beta hpfan224, and to everyone who's read and reviewed, also to those of you who've favourited this story or put it on your alerts.

**Chapter 9 – With Love, The Marauders 2.0**

Dumbledore stood and smiled around at them again. "Just a few more words, now that we are all fed and watered" he announced, "I have a few start of term notices to give you all. First-years should note that the Dark Forest is strictly forbidden to all students. A few of the older students would do well to remember that as well".

For an instant his twinkling bright blue eyes fell on the Weasley twins, Fred and George just stared back a little too innocently from where they were sitting next to Lyra. His eyes then flickered briefly to Lyra and then to Harry, just for an instant, but it was enough for her to catch him. She just smirked up at him and his smile grew wider at the obvious challenge of his authority.

"I have also been asked by our caretaker, Mr Filch" he continued, "to remind you that magic is not to be used in the corridors between classes. And that the list of forbidden items is on display on the door of his office".

Even as he was saying that Lyra could tell Dumbledore knew not a single student was going to go check that list, or refrain from using magic in the corridorsbetween classes. And that the list of forbidden items is on display on the door of his office".

Even as he was saying that Lyra could tell Dumbledore knew not a single student was going to check that list, or refrain from using magic in the corridors. Well, she, Harry and the twins might check out the list. But only to get the things on it to annoy Filch.

"Quidditch trials will be held in the second week of term. Anyone who wishes to play for their house team should contact Madame Hooch" he indicated with his hand to a woman with sharp, hawk-like golden brown eyes and short hair. "And finally, the third floor corridor on the right hand side is firmly out of bounds to everyone who does not wish to die a most painful death".

Lyra was a little shocked at that last announcement.

"He's not serious?" Harry asked her under his breath. She shrugged.

"Must be" Lyra answered him watching Dumbledore uncertainly.

"That's weird, he usually gives us a reason we're not allowed go somewhere" George commented.

"One we never listen to" Fred interjected, "But one all the same".

"Now before we go to bed, let us sing the school song" Dumbledore cried delightedly.

Lyra groaned to herself. She could see from where she was sitting that all of the other teacher's smiles had become rather fixed and their eyes were screaming anything but happiness at the mention of the dreaded song. She sneaked a glance up at Remus and had to stop herself snorting at him. He was blatantly wearing an expression of abhorrence at the thought of the school song and was shaking his head sadly.

_Is the school song really that bad?_ Lyra asked herself, she hadn't ever heard it before, as surprising as it was.

"Everyone pick your favourite tune" Dumbledore instructed the school. He flicked his wand and a ribbon of gold flew out of it and rose high above the tables, twisting itself into snake-like words. "And off we go!" Dumbledore exclaimed joyously and the whole school bellowed:

"_Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hoggy Warty Hogwarts,_

_Teach us something please,_

_Whether we be old and bald_

_Or young with scabby knees,_

_Our heads could do with filling_

_With some interesting stuff,_

_For now they're bare and full of air,_

_Dead flies and bits of fluff,_

_So teach us something worth knowing,_

_Bring back what we've forgot,_

_Just do your best, we'll do the rest,_

_And learn until our brains all rot_".

Lyra sang along softly with her fellow students. She picked the tune of her favourite song to play. It was by a muggle composer, she couldn't remember their name. While she sang along quietly the twins were basically bellowing out the lyrics to the tune of a slow funeral march. That made it kind of hard to sing without laughing at the two of them trying to look serious.

Everyone ended up finishing the song at different times. Typically the twins were the very last to finish, still going long after everyone else had finished. Still, Dumbledore happily conducted their last few lines with his wand. And when they finished he was one of the people who clapped the loudest.

"Ahh, music" he said wistfully wiping a tear from his eyes, "A magic far beyond what we teach here! And now, bedtime. Off you trot. First-years follow your house prefects to your dormitories"

The first year Gryffindors followed the twins' brother Percy out of the hall, all of them except Lyra and Harry anyway. They stayed with the twins who had pulled them aside saying, "The way Percy's going will take forever. Just come with us".

Now, Lyra had no intention of going with the prefects anyway, but she was glad the twins had offered to start showing them the secret passages. Because even though she had gone exploring the castle before, she didn't know a quarter as much about the place as they did. The twins led Lyra and Harry through a secret door across the hall from them and opened it using a trick brick, quickly sealing it after them.

"It's always the sixth over from the statue's knee and eight up" Fred told them and they nodded, trying to remember that.

"It's all in the map anyway" George said as they strolled along the gently sloping passage, "Just in case you forget".

Fred now had his nose in said map and had come to a stop. "All clear" he proclaimed and opened the door. The four of them slid out of the passage and the younger two followed the Weasley's lead.

"We're on the sixth floor" Fred told them, pointing out where they were on the map. Lyra could see four little dots labelled with their names standing right next to a tapestry.

"The common room's right above us" George said walking over to the tapestry and pulling it back to reveal a flight of steps.

"We go up here and we'll come out right across from the common room".

They walked up the stairs and the twins continued showing them on the map where the exits off the main flight went. They stopped outside one at the opposite side of the first landing and Fred checked for anyone patrolling the corridors again.

"We're good" he said and they skulked out from behind the tapestry and over to a large portrait of a very fat woman in a pink silk dress. Lyra guessed she was the Fat Lady.

"Password?" she asked in a stately voice.

Lyra turned to the twins, "Do either of you know the password?"

They both looked to the other for the password, then back at Lyra and Harry. "Not a clue" they said together.

"Great" Harry said sarcastically.

Lyra thought for a minute and then clicked her fingers. "Piertotum Locomotor" she said confidently and the portrait swung open revealing the entrance to Gryffindor tower.

"How did you know the password?" George asked as they climbed through the hole in the wall and into the cosy common room that was decorated in rich reds and glimmering golds. There were squishy armchairs and couches scattered around the place, along with desks and coffee tables for doing homework on.

"Guessed" Lyra answered over her shoulder as she went to sit on one of the comfy armchairs that surrounded the crackling fire.

They stopped moving for a second and stared at her.

"What made you think guessing was going to work?" Fred asked her.

"I know my aunt" she said "and she told me a few days ago that she's always wanted to use that spell. Never had the need to though".

"You know we'll have to start calling her Professor McGonagall now don't you?" Harry said taking the chair next to hers. Lyra made a face.

"That's gonna be really weird".

"Yeah, and we're gonna have to call Moony Professor Lupin".

"That's not gonna work" Lyra said trying to imagine calling Remus 'Professor Lupin'. It just didn't seem right.

"Yeah, I know" Harry agreed.

"What d'you think they'd say if we started calling him Moony too?" Fred asked chuckling.

"I don't think he'd say anything" Lyra told them with a fond smile as she thought of her uncle, "He'd probably just laugh at you".

"Well then Ly, what's this brilliant plan of yours?" Harry asked turning to her expectantly, "Is it one of the ones we've been working on over the summer?"

"Nope" she answered grinning evilly, "I came up with this one on the train, it's gonna be brilliant".

"We'll leave you to it then" Fred said and they looked at him confused.

"As much as we'd love to get in on this" George began to explain.

"This is your debut" Fred said acting like a proud mother.

"You deserve all the glory" George winked and the two got up and headed up to the dormitories.

"We'll give you this though" Fred said handing them the map as he passed then, "We won't need it until tomorrow".

"Thanks" Lyra said and took the map, "See you then".

She spent about five minutes running Harry through the plan and gathering all the things they'd need for it. She rushed up to her dormitory, she only found it because of the map, and dropped what they didn't need into her trunk. Now all they had to do was wait for the perfect time to strike.

Harry glanced over at the clock, "Everyone should be gone from the hall by now. We should get going before everyone else arrives up here".

"Yeah" Lyra agreed checking the map. Harry was right, as usual, the Great Hall was totally empty. Not even Filch or the ghosts were still there. She searched the halls for the Gryffindors and eventually found a name she recognised.

"They're nearly here, if we leave now we'll be gone before they get here and the sixth floor'll be empty for about five minutes" she reported.

"Perfect" Harry agreed and they stood up to leave. Just before they left through the portrait hole Harry threw his invisibility cloak over them.

"Good thinking" Lyra whispered to him as the portrait swung open.

"Who's there" the Fat Lady asked as they crept across the hall silently.

They made their way back down to the Great Hall through the passages Fred and George showed them, using the map to check for any patrolling teachers and to make sure they stayed on the right path. They soon reached the Entrance Hall and slowly and carefully pushed open the old doors to the Great Hall. It was silent except for their practically inaudible footsteps and quite breathing.

"Let's get to work" Lyra said to Harry and stepped out from under the cloak.

Harry kept the cloak on as he worked, to make sure they wouldn't forget it or anything, and they got down to business. By the time they were done, three quarters of an hour later by Harry's watch, Lyra was sure they were going to break their fathers' and uncle's record with this.

When they were done they collected their materials and crept their way back to Gryffindor tower, taking half the time to get there this time. They separated at the doors to their dormitories.

"See you tomorrow Ly" Harry whispered as he quietly opened the door to the boy's staircase.

"Sure" Lyra whispered back, "Be prepared for about two weeks of detentions"

"I'm sure Min'll give us more than that" Harry argued.

"Well it'll be a first offence; Dumbledore will talk her down to two".

"Hope you're right Ly".

He closed the door after sending her one last smile and she walked up the spiral staircase to her own dorm room sleepily.

Lyra pitied the girl who was gonna try and wake her up in the morning, and the rest of the girls she was going to be rooming with. It was going to be their first encounter with zombie-bitch Lyra.

She crawled into her red and white four poster bed and fell asleep the moment her head hit the pillow, thoroughly exhausted. If she dreamt that night she didn't remember any of it.

oOoOoOoOoOo

The next day Lyra woke up surprisingly early. She couldn't remember what woke her up, but it wasn't any of the other girls, they were all still fast asleep. She glanced over at her clock, it was only half six in the morning. Just great. She thought she might as well get up; she'd have to soon enough anyway.

When she did step out of the bed she hissed in pain. She looked down to try and find what was causing her pain and was shocked into silence. The scars on her arm were all red and enflamed, like they'd only just healed. From the way her back, neck and stomach all ached when she moved she guessed the ones there were the same way too. _Not again_. She thought with a groan.

She glanced back at her bed. The white sheets were spattered with blood and ripped in places. She started to panic. If any of the other girls woke up how was she going to explain what happened to the bed? And her scars. How was she going to make up an excuse for those?

She pulled her wand out from under her pillow; ever since she got it she slept with it there, and preformed a quick "Reparo" and "Scourgify" charm on them. She was incredibly glad she'd bothered to learn them like Andy suggested. They did come in _very_ handy.

She plodded tiredly into the bathroom and took a proper look at the damage her scars took in the massive mirror. It was worse than she thought. They were really sore and still very tender. She couldn't touch anything off them without getting a sharp jolt of pain through her whole body. Clothes rubbing off them all day and people banging into her in the halls wasn't going to make them any better.

She thought that she should probably go to Madame Pomfrey about them, but if she did the matron would keep her in the hospital wing for the day. And, as swatty as it sounds, she didn't want to miss her first day of classes. So she sucked it up, threw on her uniform, brushed her teeth and tied her hair up into a pony tail, letting the curls fall loosely down her back.

She noticed when she was packing her bag that there was now a Gryffindor crest on the left hand side of her robes, and her tie was now striped red and gold instead of plain black. You've got to love magic. She smiled down at the lion. Yup, the hat had definitely gotten this one right.

She didn't know what she'd need so she decided to just shove in some quills and parchment for now and grab the books she'd need for the day after breakfast.

With nothing else to do in the dormitory and the other girls starting to wake up now Lyra left to go sit in the common room and wait for Harry, Fred and George. She didn't have to wait long. Harry walked happily over to where she was sitting in the same seat as the night before and plopped down next to her.

"Can't wait to see the look on Moony's face" he said to her excitedly.

"I know, I can't wait to see Snape's" she told him as a bunch of older students passed them on their way down to get breakfast. "D'you know if the twins are coming down yet?" she asked.

"Yeah, they'll be down in a minute or two" he answered, "it's gonna go off at quarter past isn't it?"

"Yeah, at least it will if the timer is set up right" Lyra answered uncertainly.

"Don't worry Ly" Harry said comfortingly, "I'm sure it'll go just fine".

Lyra knew she probably should've mentioned her scars to Harry. But she couldn't make herself say anything. He wouldn't know what to do about them even if she told him. And then he'd be worrying incessantly about her for the rest of the day. Then he wouldn't be able to concentrate on any of their classes and would probably break something by accident.

The twins arrived soon after that and they went down to breakfast in what would soon become their usual way, through the secret passages. They sat at the Gryffindor table and Lyra grabbed herself some bacon and scrambled eggs.

"Are you gonna tell us what you've got planned?" George asked.

"Nope" Harry and Lyra said at the same time.

"You'll find out soon anyway" Harry informed them.

"Can't wait" Fred said gleefully rubbing his hands together.

Everything went smoothly until the heads of the houses got up to give their students out their timetables for the year. It was then that the clock on the wall over the Slytherin table reached quarter past.

A colossal explosion of red slime shot out of the ceiling above the Slytherin table, drenching all of the students sitting there, and a few at the Hufflepuff table, which was the next one over, and that end of the staff table in a sticky gooey slime. Everyone was taken so much by surprise that no one did anything to try and stop it as it happened again at the Hufflepuff table. And then again at the Ravenclaw table, and finally the Gryffindor table.

Even when the teachers had gotten over their shock, none of them knew how to stop it. So, drenched in bright red goo, some people resolved to try and flee the Great hall, but they failed miserably by slipping and sliding around and landing either on their faces or their arses most of the time.

Lyra, unlike most people in the hall, jumped up onto the table laughing like a mad woman as more slime started oozing from the four walls, which set off the wet-start fireworks. They zoomed around the huge hall, exploding in a beautiful blinding burst of colour every few seconds.

She scooped up a handful of goo and threw it at Harry, who had joined her on the table after the fireworks were set off. He dodged it expertly and threw one back at her. The twins were laughing their arses off and standing on their chairs throwing handfuls of slime at random people who tried to pass them. They got someone right in the stomach and they fell over onto their arse and went sliding down the aisle between the tables.

Their fun was cut short a few minutes later by two of the professors. They were so covered in goo that Lyra couldn't see who they were. They cast a spell on the walls that stopped the oozing and blew up the remaining fireworks – which blinded all the other teachers and students when they went up in a bright shower of sparks.

When everyone eventually calmed down and the hall was quite they stood in front of the staff table looking murderously angry. Well so did the rest of the staff, except Dumbledore. He just looked amused.

"WEASLEYS!" yelled who Lyra could now tell was Snape. He wiped the red stuff from his face, looking like he was about to burst an artery.

"I'm pretty sure it wasn't the twins Severus" Remus said from his place beside the Potions Master, wiping his own face clean with the back of his hand.

Snape being Snape was about to make some sort of snappish, sarcastic remark when something else happened. There was another deafening bang and a back blur shot past them toward the back wall. The teachers ducked out of its way just in time. A loud 'splat' resounded around the hall and everyone looked up to see what it was.

The staffs' jaws dropped, and some of them looked like they were about to turn to Dumbledore and quit right then and there, as they read the message splattered across the wall and Hogwarts crest in thick, messy black writing.

**With Love, **

**The Marauders.**

Everyone in the hall stared at that message for a whole minute before anyone did anything. Most of the students didn't have a clue why those simple words had such an effect on the teachers. The first sound to break the heavy silence was a whimper from professor Flitwick. The staff then all turned to look at Lyra, who was grinning from ear to ear like a maniac, and Harry, who had burst out laughing and was still holding a glob of red goo.

It was Minerva who finally addressed the two of them. "You two!" she yelled, enraged, "My office NOW!"

Lyra just laughed at her aunt and jumped from the table, landing without falling on her face, and walked out of the hall at Harry's side. They giggled to each other as they ran along the corridors to Minerva's office.

Minerva came to give out to them as soon as she'd cleaned herself up. She yelled herself horse at them. Students making their way to classes around the school heard her and ran the rest of the way to class, afraid of getting caught in the deputy headmistress's warpath.

They got in huge trouble for that little fiasco, but as far as Lyra was concerned it was worth it. And she was right; Dumbledore did talk her aunt down to giving them two weeks of detention instead of two months. But no points were taken from Gryffindor. Either because Minerva was so angry she forgot to do it, or because they didn't have any points to take yet.

The Weasley twins were impressed with them for that as a first prank. Hell, even the teachers were a little, begrudgingly, impressed with them.

The rest of Lyra's first week was spent having fun with Harry, Fred and George, going to her classes and pulling more pranks. And her scars did, eventually, heal up by that Friday.

The first day was the only time Lyra and Harry let themselves get caught, and that only because they wanted to break the old marauder's record. They had to clean the Great Hall by themselves, but beating their parents and uncle was more than worth all the scrubbing. Well they only scrubbed until Lyra realised she could clean it with magic.

After that fiasco no one could find a trace of their involvement in anything else they did. Everyone knew it was the four of them, but they couldn't for the life of them prove it. And boy, did Filch and Snape try.

But her first week wasn't all plain sailing. Wherever she, Harry and the twins went whispers and gossip followed them.

"Did you see him? The kid with the scar?"

"Did you see her? She looked mad!"

"How long till she gets herself thrown in Azkaban?"

Lyra tried her best to ignore them, but it really got on her nerves the first few days. She has gotten much better at blocking them out since then.

She found very soon that the class most of the first years were looking forward to was DADA – DefenceAgainst the Dark Arts – the class her uncle Moony taught. But they unfortunately didn't have that on the first day. They _did_ have transfiguration with Lyra's aunt Min, who was still very angry at her and Harry over that morning.

The second they were all settled in their seats she gave them a talking to, "Transfiguration is some of the most complex, dangerous magic you'll learn during your time at Hogwarts" she began sternly, "If there is anyone caught messing around in my class you will be removed immediately. You have been warned". She then whipped out her wand and turned her desk into a pig and back.

Lyra, and most of the rest of her classmates, was severely disappointed to learn that they wouldn't be turning the furniture into farm animals any time soon. Instead Minerva had them take down a series of mind bogglingly complicated notes and gave each of them a match, which they were supposed to turn into a needle.

Lyra was glad she had already taught herself this spell. If she hadn't then the notes would've made her head explode. So forgetting the notes altogether she waved her wand at the match and it turned into a sewing needle in front of her eyes. She smiled to herself in congratulations, and sat back to relax. Before she could get too comfortable Minerva came around to inspect hers and Harry's work. She looked at Lyra's needle and back up at the girl who just smiled easily at her.

"Ms Black, would you try again" she said and Lyra sat back up to the desk.

Minerva gave her a new match and Lyra pointed her wand at it. With a wave of her wand it turned into another sewing needle. Lyra could see that her aunt was shocked, but Minerva held her composure. Minerva held up her needle to the class and gave Lyra a rare smile – well a rare in class smile. She could see her aunt's anger at her was starting to dissolve and be replaced with pride that her niece was doing well in her subject.

"Very well done Ms Black" she said to Lyra, "Five points to Gryffindor. Mr Potter" she said turning to Harry who was sitting on Lyra's left. He gulped; Harry hadn't been able to make any difference to his match yet.

He concentrated intensely on his match – so intensely that Lyra thought his face would end up getting stuck like that – and waved his wand at it saying the incantation forcefully. He managed to make it turn silver and pointier, and Lyra could see he was very happy with that. Minerva gave him another five points.

By the end of class only Lyra, Harry and Hermione Granger had managed to make any change to their matches.

Their next class was charms, taught by professor Flitwick. He was a tiny man, only a little taller than Lyra, who stood on a pile of books to be able to see over the top of his desk and had a soft, squeaky voice. Lyra thought he was quite nice, and very funny.

Flitwick started their class by taking the roll. When he came to Lyra's name he dropped the parchment and glanced around the classroom frantically.

"Lyra Black?" he repeated as if hoping it was just a typo on the roll. Lyra raised her hand in a bored manner to the second calling of her name. He let out a tiny, nearly inaudible, whimper and continued calling the roll.

It was after that Lyra recognised him as the teacher who looked like he was going to faint when he read hers and Harry's message that morning – the message they couldn't get off for days. Thank Zonko's for unwashable paint.

That thought made Lyra smile to herself, which made Flitwick a little more scared of her.

When Flitwick made it to Harry's name on the roll he actually toppled of his pile of books and disappeared from view. This time Lyra couldn't stop herself laughing at the poor teacher. That earned her an elbow in the side and a hiss to shut up from Harry who was sitting beside her.

Their History of Magic teacher, Mr Binns, was the only Hogwarts teacher who was a ghost. You see, Mr Binns was quite old indeed when he took a nap in the staff room between classes one day. And then when he got up to teach his next class he left his body behind.

You'd think that the ghost teacher would be interesting.

You would be very, _very_ wrong.

Binns turned out to be the most boring teacher in the history of the universe as far as Lyra was concerned. He droned on and on in his monotone voice for the entire class. What made it even worse was that it was the class before lunch they had him that first day. It was so infuriating to Lyra, and probably every other student present.

He didn't sound like he'd ever been human his voice was that monotonous. He even somehow managed to make goblins and wizards going crazy and killing each other in brutal, merciless and very creative ways boring as hell.

But, there was one good thing about him; even Lyra had to admit that. He was always so wrapped up in his notes that he didn't have a clue what was going on in the class outside of that. That weakness was something the entire class used to their advantage in every class. Lyra normally did some of the mountain of homework they were always assigned during his classes so she'd have time to do something more worthwhile after school. If she managed to get it all done before Binns' class was over she spent the rest of the time passing notes to Harry, trying to throw paper balls into the bin, or just sleeping.

Her and Harry made up a game for his class one day when they were particularly bored. They had to make five balls of parchment, and then they took turns throwing them through Binns. 20 points if it went through his stomach, 30 if it went through his chest, 50 for his head, 10 for any of his limbs and 70 for the crotch – that last one was Lyra's idea.

Hermione Granger tried to give out to them when she caught the two of them playing it one day, but they just ignored her and kept going. Then she tried to stop their parchment balls from hitting Binns, but Lyra taught Harry how to put a small shield around them then to foil her plan.

When they finally had the class they were all looking forward to most the first years lined up outside the class early and waited eagerly for Remus to arrive. They were looking forward to it so much for a couple of reasons. Firstly, because it seemed to be the most interesting subject to most of the students, both the first years and the majority of the older students.

Secondly, because they'd all heard countless stories about Professor Lupin, as they had to call him, from their older siblings or older students in their common rooms since they'd arrived at Hogwarts. All those stories painted him to be the nicest teacher in the school. Class was never dull with Lupin, the older DADA students would tell the first years in the common room if they asked about him, he hates learning out of books, so he almost always has a practical planned.

Lyra knew all they said was true, and that her uncle was a big believer in learning by doing. He'd already taught her and Harry a lot of the first year course for DADA and a good bit about healing spells. He had a lot of opportunity for teaching them the latter with Lyra around the house. So she knew he was a brilliant teacher.

When he came to let them into the room he sent a wink to Lyra and Harry when the rest of the first year Gryffindors weren't looking. They had all sat down and taken out their books, quills and parchment when Remus turned around to speak to them, having just finished with the notes on the board.

"Alright class, take down those notes then but your books away, and wands out" he said with a clap of his hands.

Lyra looked up at the board to find it covered in writing and drawings of a demonstration of a spell Lyra knew all about. It was one of the first things her dad had ever taught her and Harry. How to disarm an opponent, one of the most important skills to have as a wizard according to her dad. The Expelliarmus spell.

As they scribbled down the notes Remus spoke again, "Now, as first years most teachers would think you'd be too young to start learning to defend yourselves in battle. That, children, is a load of utter rubbish" he began, "While I'm your teacher we'll be spending half our time learning about dark, dangerous, mysterious creatures and the other training you up to be able to defend yourselves against anyone who may try to harm you. Because, believe me, while Voldemort may be gone, and the Death Eaters disbanded, it's still a very dangerous world out there" he told them all seriously, totally ignoring the students who flinched at the sound of Voldemort's name.

He continued after a few moments, "Everything taken down from the board?"

When everyone nodded he told them to put away their things and stand away from their desks. With a flick of his wand all the desks were stacked against the walls and the chairs were piled up out of the way.

"Alright, I'm going to put you into pairs and you're going to practise the spell on each other. Only aim to disarm, if you try anything else at the moment you'll only end up hurting yourself" he told them as he paired them off, "Oh – and try to land on the cushions behind you" he conjured up a pile of soft, comfy looking cushions behind each student.

Lyra and Harry were standing opposite each other ready to start, but Remus spotted them right away, gave them a stern look and headed over to separate them. "Not a chance you two" he said starting to move Harry away from Lyra, "The school'll be in ruins if I let both of you spar. Find another partner".

"But Professor –" Harry tried to argue.

"No, Mr Potter" Remus interrupted with an air of finality and gave him a look that couldn't be argued with, "You're with Mr Weasley, Ms Black you're with Ms Granger. I won't have any arguments".

Lyra and Harry sighed and let Remus separate them. Harry went to stand with Ron and Hermione stood in front of Lyra a little reluctantly. Lyra looked at Hermione and shrugged. This was going to be easier then she expected.

Remus came over to Lyra again as he was checked to see if everyone was alright to start. "Did you really think I was going to let you two practice together?" he asked her in a whisper with a smirk, "You're hazardous enough on your own"

Remus stood once again at the top of the room. "On the count of three you may begin" he instructed the excited first years. Lyra gripped her wand and watched Hermione intently. '_Never_ _take your eyes off an_ _opponent_' she heard Mad-Eye's voice echo through her head.

"One…" Remus started, "Two…" another pause…would he just get on with it already! Lyra was ready to steamroll over Hermione. "THREE!" Remus yelled and ducked, which was a good idea, because lots of badly aimed spells went flying around the room, some right at where he had just been standing.

The second the last word was out of his mouth though Lyra made her move. She flicked her wand swiftly and without uttering a word Hermione was hit right in the chest, before she even had the chance to move. Her wand flew into the air and as she fell back onto the cushions piled up behind her. Lyra darted out and caught it easily, with an incredibly smug smile on her face as Hermione sat up looking stunned.

"How…" Hermione trailed off and Lyra's smile grew into a full blown grin. She threw the other girl back her wand without saying anything.

Remus called the class to attention again, "You're all hesitating too much. If you were in a real life duel you'd be beaten within seconds" he shook his head, "Don't be so worried or cautious, just let your gut tell you what to do" he advised and told them to go back to their original positions.

"We'll try it again, okay" he said and began the countdown a second time, "One…"

"Two…"

"THREE!"

Harry struck again the second Remus had finished the countdown. This time Ron was knocked clean off his feet.

They spent the rest of the class doing pretty much the same thing. Remus did eventually end up having to put Lyra and Harry working together. It was the only way to let the others get a shot in to practise. The two themselves found it much better working together anyway.

"Five points each" Remus whispered to them as they packed up their things to leave, "Great work".

Hermione didn't talk to either Lyra or Harry for the rest of the day, not even when they started playing the Binns game in History of Magic again. Her ego was far too bruised after their defence class for her to even think about it. That, and she got the feeling while she was sparring with Lyra that she could do far more damage than simply knocking her backwards, and without even breaking a sweat.

Quite frankly Lyra didn't care one bit if she scared Hermione. It wasn't her problem to deal with and she was far too busy planning the execution of her next prank with Harry and the twins. It involved Filch, dungbombs, permanent sticking charms, unwashable body paint and a thumbtack. It was going to get _a little_ messy. And they might end up getting another two weeks a detention out of it, but that was only if they got caught, which Lyra was sure they wouldn't.


	10. The Potion's Master

**Lyra Black and the Philosopher's Stone**

**A/N - **Hello again everyone! I'm back with the next installment of the Philosopher's Stone. As usual I'd like to give thanks to my beta hpfan224 and all of you who've read and reviewed. Anyhoo, on with the story.

**Chapter 10 – The Potions Master**

There was one class that Lyra was particularly dreading. I'm sure you can guess which one that is. If you didn't get it, it's Potions. She didn't have anything against the subject itself but Snape was the teacher, so that kind of sealed her fate in that class. But she was lucky in that they didn't have potions until Friday.

Lyra had thought that she actually might like potions if it weren't for Snape. She'd read over her school books and a few others from the library at Potter Manor and found it quite interesting. But Snape was sure to single her and Harry out for his favourite punching bags when he was in a pissy mood. That kind of undeserved hatred can tend to ruin something for you.

Right now she was sitting at the Gryffindor table with Harry, Fred and George. They were talking about how they found the teachers so far, and of course talk turned to Snape.

"He always favours the Slytherins since he's their head of house", Fred said venomously while glaring at the potions master.

"Greasy git hates Gryffindors especially for some reason", George spat, "Don't know why".

"It's because he's a slimy git who has yet to discover the wonders of shampoo George", Fred said to his twin in a patronising voice. George rolled his eyes.

"Well, we'll be able to see what he's like soon enough", Harry said frowning down at his porridge, "We've got double Potions with him and the Slytherins later this morning".

"Wait what?" Lyra asked dropping her spoon into her corn flakes.

"We've got double Potions today, with the Slytherins", Harry repeated for her benefit, since she obviously hadn't been paying attention the first time.

"Aww…well fuck my life", she groaned, "Are you serious?".

"Yeah", Harry nodded.

She pushed away her food feeling suddenly ill, "That's just ruined my apatite", she announced to her friends and made a face at her bowl.

"Just try and stay out of his way", George advised.

"While you're in class anyway", Fred said.

"He can get pretty nasty", George continued ignoring his brother momentarily.

"But when you get out of class…", Fred trailed off for dramatic effect.

When Fred had finished speaking Lyra heard the post arrive. The fluttering of the wings of hundreds of owls reached her ears now that her friends had quietened down. Among the assorted breeds of owls she saw the lone snowy owl that occupied the Owlery. Hedwig soared overhead and landed next to Harry's bowl. She held a scrap of parchment in her beak and waited patiently for Harry to take it from her.

He flipped it open to read and Lyra read it over his shoulder. It read in a very untidy scrawl:

_Dear Harry and Lyra,_

_I know you get Friday afternoons off, so would you like to come have a cup of tea with me around three? I want to hear all about your first week. Send us back an answer with Hedwig._

_Hagrid_

Harry grabbed a quill from Lyra's bag, even though his was right beside hers, and scribbled yes please, see you later on the back of the scrap of parchment Hagrid had used to send his letter. He gave Hedwig a slice of toast and she flew off again with their response. Lyra snatched her quill back from Harry before he could forget it was hers. If she didn't she'd never get it back.

The visit to Hagrid's later cheered her up a hell of a lot, enough to forget all about freaking out over Potions. Fred brought up their plans for Filch then and that dominated the conversation for almost all the rest of breakfast. They were hoping to set it up that night so it was all they talked about, in hushed tones of course, until Minerva appeared behind Lyra making her jump. She hadn't noticed her aunt approaching them she was so absorbed in their prank plans.

"Ms Black, may I see you in my office?" she asked, but she said it in a tone that left no room for Lyra to deny her request.

"Sure Professor", Lyra said and got up to follow her aunt out of the hall. She answered the confused looks Harry and the twins were sending her with a confused shrug and a shake of her head. Minerva led her out of the hall and into the same chamber off to the left of the Entrance Hall that she'd left the first years in before their Sorting.

"Lyra, I want to talk to you about the extra lessons we mentioned to you during the summer", Minerva started, then stopped and heaved out a sigh.

"What about them aunt Min?" Lyra asked calling her aunt the name she was far more comfortable calling her now that they were in private, "Aren't I supposed to wait until the end of the month to start them?"

"Yes, that was the plan", she said and took a deep breath, "But we have been keeping an eye on you the past week and we feel that by the end of the month you will most definitely need them".

"Alright", Lyra said trying to hold back a grimace at the thought of extra lessons with Snape, "But why are you talking to me about them now?"

"Well Lyra, we might be starting them a little earlier then we first thought", Minerva explained to her, "Depending on how you do next week we will be starting them the Monday after next".

"Oh", was all Lyra could say.

"Don't worry too much about it. If it proves to be too much for you yet we can stop them and wait another while", Minerva tried to ease Lyra's worry.

"Thanks aunt Min", she said even though she wasn't feeling all that much better. The thoughts of having to go to Snape's classes after dropping out of the extra work was worse than the horror she felt at having to go to the additional lessons with him in the first place.

"You should get going to class now, Severus doesn't tolerate lateness even if he knows you were with me", Minerva said to Lyra who looked back up at her from where she had been glaring at the floor.

Lyra managed to grin at her as she left the chamber to go back to the Great Hall to grab her bag. Once she had it she raced down to the potions room using a few of the secret passages Fred and George had taught her about in the dungeons. She was lucky she knew them because she just got to the classroom door as her classmates were filing into the room. She joined them and pretended that she'd been there the whole time.

Once she was safely inside the classroom Lyra slipped into the seat next to Harry before anyone else could even think about sitting there. Luckily Snape wasn't in the room at the moment; otherwise he wouldn't have let her sit with Harry for all the gold in Gringots.

She looked around the dull grey, cold and draughty dungeon classroom. It wasn't very welcoming. But then again, it was Snape's classroom, what did she expect?vThere were cupboards filled with different potions ingredients and shelves with different sized jars filled with pickled animals or animal bits floating in them. They were pretty creepy. And the room would've been eerie enough without all the floating dead animals to try and avoid looking at. They didn't bother Lyra as much as they seemed to some of the other students sitting around waiting for Snape's return, but still she thought they were a bit of overkill on the creepy factor.

Snape burst back into the room a few seconds later, when the class was sufficiently freaked out by his choice of decorations. Lyra thought his entrance was a bit over dramatic, but she had come to expect that when it came to Snape.

He, like Flitwick, started the class by taking the roll. He paused at her name to shoot her a look of pure hatred.

"Lyra Black", he said venomously and from that second Lyra knew she was screwed in this class for the rest of her time at Hogwarts.

"Here", she said in an unconcerned voice, acting as if Snape wasn't looking at her like he wanted her to burst into flames.

He paused when he came to Harry's name too, but he didn't just glare this time, "Harry Potter", he said softly, "Our new – celebrity", he sneered mockingly and Lyra saw Draco and the boy trolls snigger behind their hands. The boy called Gabriel just smirked when his eyes flickered up to meet Draco's.

Lyra had wanted to try and keep an open mind when it came to Snape. She knew well that her dad considered him a good for nothing, arrogant, bigot. But she also knew not to take her dad's opinions of someone as fact. He had a tendency to be very biased when it came to people who'd hurt someone close to him. She wanted to make her own mind up about Snape first. So she took a good, critical, honest look at him as he finished taking the roll.

Her Potions professor had jet black hair that he wore down to his chin and like he'd never picked up a bottle of shampoo. He had very pale sallow skin and a fairly large hooked nose. The expression he wore almost constantly was either stern or sour, and both promised hell to any person who dared to anger him. His eyes were black and looked like Hagrid's at first glance. But on further inspection Snape's had a barely noticeable line of red around the edges – that's really strange Lyra thought as she looked into the cold orbs. They reminded her of long dark hallways that had something at the end that was too far away for her to see properly.

She was interrupted from her inspection by him speaking about something other than the roll that sounded relatively important. She decided that she should probably start paying attention to the lesson now.

"You are all here to learn the subtle science and exact art of potion-making", he began in a deadly serious voice. Lyra wanted to make a funny face at him for the hell of it, but resisted the urge, "As there is little foolish wand waving here, I doubt many of you will believe that this is magic".

Snape spoke very softly, in barley more than a whisper, but Lyra, and the rest of the class she was sure, caught every word he was saying without difficulty. He, like her aunt Min and uncle Moony, seemed to have the gift of keeping any class silent without any effort.

"I don't expect many of you will truly understand the beauty of the gently simmering cauldron with its shimmering fumes, the delicate power of the liquids that can creep through human veins, bewitching the mind and ensnaring the senses…I can teach you all how to bottle fame, brew glory, even put a stopper on death – that is if you all aren't as big a crowd of dunderheads as I normally have to teach", he finished glancing around at them all.

Lyra had been thinking that if Snape ever got tired of teaching he could easily become a poet, or a writer of some kind. That is until the 'dunderheads' comment. That sort of ruined his speech. But before that it was great.

His little speech was followed by yet more silence. Harry caught Lyra's eye and they exchanged a look. Apparently her dad was wrong about one thing, that Snape was harmless. Boy he could be scary when he wanted to be. And at that moment he was bloody terrifying.

Lyra quickly peeked around the classroom to check if the rest of her classmates were thinking along the same lines as her and Harry. As she did she saw that the boy, Gabriel, looked quite interested in what Snape had to say. Draco was twirling his quill in his hands. The trolls were staring blankly ahead of them – waiting for their next order. Ron and Seamus were half asleep. Neville looked like he was about to wet his pants – the poor thing. And Hermione was on the edge of her seat, looking as though she was desperate to prove she wasn't a dunderhead.

"Potter!" he said so suddenly that it made both Lyra and Harry jump in their seats, "What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?" he asked.

Harry looked desperately to Lyra for some kind of help. Potions was far from one his strong points, it was however one of Lyra's. She knew the answer and tried to mouth it to him, but Snape saw what she was trying to do and gave her such a withering look that she stopped. She sent Harry an apologetic look.

Snape looked back at Harry and was watching him so intently that Lyra thought she might be able to get a message to him now. As subtly as she could she mimed going to sleep, but Harry didn't see her. She could see Hermione Granger's hand up in the air; it had been there since Snape asked the question. She looked like she'd burst if Snape didn't ask her. Lyra wished she'd put it down. It really wasn't helping Harry think of an answer.

"I don't know sir", Harry admitted.

"Tut, tut – fame clearly isn't everything", he mocked and Lyra openly glared murderously at him.

"Black!" he snapped turning his cold gaze to Lyra. She guessed he either wanted her to answer the question, stop glaring at him, or possibly both.

"The Draught of Living Death sir, a powerful sleeping potion", she answered quietly, without hesitation. Lyra could tell by the look on Snape's face he didn't expect her to know that at all. And she shouldn't really; none of the other first years, except Hermione apparently, knew it. It was a sixth year potion, the only reason she knew about it was because she got hold of her dad's old potions books from when he was in school. Snape just wanted to make them look like fools.

"Alright Black", he conceded resentfully, "Where would you look if I told you to find me a bezoar?" he asked her and she very nearly smirked.

"I'd look in the supply closet sir", she answered, failing to suppress a cheeky grin, "But if there wasn't one in there I'd look in a goat's stomach".

A few people laughed at that but Lyra kept her gaze steady and focused on the potions master, even though she could tell a few of her classmates were trying to catch her eye for some reason. Didn't they get that she was in the middle of an old west styled showdown here?

"What is the difference, Black, between monkswood and wolfsbane?" he snapped at her angrily. He was obviously a little peeved by her last answer.

"There isn't one", she replied coolly, "They're just different names for the same plant".

Snape glared at her, his nostrils starting to flare, but she just kept her stare steadily meeting his. She didn't even flinch, "Since you were correct I won't take any points from your house for your cheek Black. But consider this your only warning", he told her coldly and she nodded stiffly. She'd expected as much. While his back was turned Harry and Lyra looked at each other and rolled their eyes in unison.

Things got steadily worse for the Gryffindors as the lesson went on, unfortunately. Snape put them into pairs to make a simple potion to cure boils. Lyra knew how to make it already. Andy had her Mastery in Potions and Lyra helped her make this potion for Tonks after she got hit with a nasty jinx the summer before last.

She was left working with Harry since Snape couldn't say much against them in front of the class. He had no evidence to suggest they'd try and blow up the potions room if he left them to their own devices. And he wouldn't, until February.

Snape swept around the room as they worked with his long black cloak billowing out behind him, which made him look like an evil, overgrown bat in Lyra's opinion. She didn't dare share that opinion with Harry though, Snape was known for his impeccable hearing. But that only put more weight on Lyra's whole overgrown bat theory. Cansequently of this observation she spent quite a lot of the class trying not to laugh at the Potions teacher.

Snape watched as they crushed snake fangs, weighed dried nettles and stewed horned slugs. He criticised almost everyone except Draco, who he seemed to like for some reason, and Gabriel, who was working with Draco. He looked like he knew what he was doing more than anyone else in the room. And from what she could see his and Draco's potion was the most likely to work, aside from hers and Harry's anyway.

The criticism and barley less then verbal abuse of the Gryffindors continued until Snape came to Lyra and Harry's cauldron. He looked like he was getting ready to chew them out for the slightest thing wrong or off with their potion. As he looked into their cauldron though he said nothing. It seemed he was unable to find anything to justify giving out to them. Lyra pretended he wasn't there as she added in the slugs Harry stewed a few minutes ago, just like Andy taught her how to.

"Good", Snape admitted softly and stalked off once again.

Lyra stopped for an instant to exchange a look of pure shock with Harry over their cauldron. He got over it quicker than her, shrugged and went back to preparing their porcupine quills, which were to go in next.

Lyra was taking their cauldron off the fire to add in the quills in when a loud hissing suddenly filled the dungeon and acid green smoke poured out of someone's cauldron and into the air all around them. That someone was Neville. He and Ron had somehow melted their cauldron into an unrecognisable, twisted metal blob. And now their violently green potion was seeping across the floor of the classroom, burning holes into people's shoes as it went. It wasn't a pretty sight to see.

Within seconds the whole class was standing on their stools to get away from the potion turned corrosive acid. Neville who'd, unluckily for him, been drenched in the potion as it spilled out of the cauldron as it collapsed moaned loudly in pain. Angry red boils were starting to spring up all over his arms, legs and face.

"Idiot boy", snarled Snape after he cleared away the spilled potion with a sweep of his wand, "I suppose you added the porcupine quills before taking the cauldron off the fire?"

Now that the floor was clear and safe to walk on again Lyra hopped off her stool and hurried over to see if Neville was alright, "It could've happened to anyone Neville" she whispered, trying to comfort the distressed boy as Snape ranted on "I could see Parkinson was about to do the same thing". Neville just whimpered as boils started to sprout up all over his nose and neck. Lyra winced sympathetically.

"Take him to the hospital wing", Snape spat out at Ron, who rushed over to Neville and helped him to his feet, "Get back to your seat Black" he snapped at Lyra and she shot him a dirty look, but did as she was told. For now.

He then rounded on Harry who was still standing by his and Lyra's cauldron, even though he had nothing to do with what had just happened, "You – Potter – why didn't you tell him not to add the quills yet?" he demanded and Lyra gaped at him, outraged. He wasn't honestly trying to find a way to blame Harry for that was he?

"Thought it'd make you look good if Longbottom got it all wrong did you? Well that's five points you've lost from Gryffindor".

Apparently he was.

Harry looked ready to retaliate but Hermione Granger kicked him from behind the cauldrons.

"Don't push it", she warned in a whisper, "From what I've heard Snape can get pretty nasty".

"Thanks", Harry said back to her, still angry, "But we know how to handle Snape already".

The rest of the class went just as horribly. Draco was really starting to get on Lyra's nerves by now. She could hear him making fun of Neville and Harry. He even said a few nasty things about Hermione. She could clearly hear him and she was on the other side of the Merlin damned room! Why wasn't Snape doing anything about him?

He kept talking about how Remus was a crappy teacher, Hagrid was a wild, stupid, savage beast and the Aurors were a bunch of meddling idiots. And still he had nothing said to him, no points taken from him, nothing.

She knew that he was only trying to aggravate her, and that she shouldn't rise to his bait. But she wanted to give him a good old kick in the nuts so badly just to shut him up. She glanced over at him once to see the eyes that looked so like her father's lit up with glee. Still, she wanted to smash his face in.

Instead she picked up an empty, rusty old cauldron that was lying around while Snape wasn't looking, intending to whack him over the head with it. But Harry caught her before she could, and made her put it back down.

"You'll get into Merlin knows how much trouble if you try it", he tried to convince her to settle down in a hushed tone, "Don't, he's not worth it".

Lyra saw Draco throw her a superior smirk when she put the cauldron down, and that did it. She saw red. She was no longer in control of what she did. All she could think of was causing Draco Fucking Malfoy as much bodily harm as she could manage before anyone stopped her.

She put her hand up and Snape looked at her vaguely taken aback, "Professor", she began in a barley controlled voice, "What would happen if someone was to 'accidentally' drop a cauldron on someone else's head?" she asked her voice starting to slip into an angry snarl toward the end before she caught herself. Now wasn't the time to totally lose it.

"That person would get a detention and five points taken from their house", Snape told her holding back a smirk or a smile – Lyra couldn't tell, all she saw was a twitch of his lips that anyone could've easily missed. She didn't care in that moment; it was enough for her to know that he was perfectly aware of exactly why she asked the question and that he wasn't going to do anything to stop her. That basically made her decision for her.

She turned back to her potion and waited for the right moment. Draco had to pass her's and Harry's desk a little while later to get something from the supply closet. He probably thought she'd given up. Well he'd learn right now that Lyra Black never backs down.

As Draco passed Lyra's desk he felt something heavy wallop this head and block his vision. The cauldron Lyra had attempted to throw at him before Harry stopped her was now covering his head and there was a definite bump and a few deep purple bruises forming where it collided with his head. Not only that, but it was filled with ice cold water and he was now soaked through.

Lyra just stood beside her cauldron with her arms crossed over her chest and an exceedingly satisfied expression on her face, "Ooops" she said in a bored voice, showing that she wasn't sorry in the slightest, and turned back to stirring the liquid simmering away in her cauldron.

The whole class was quite for a full three seconds after that before Harry burst out laughing, and Lyra couldn't hold it in any longer when Harry started. The Gabriel boy that Draco was apparently friends with joined them. Draco just made a rude gesture at him. But that only made the golden eyed boy laugh at him even harder.

"Your detention will be tomorrow after dinner", Snape announced, looking at her with a raised eyebrow. He was expecting her to protest or complain. But her lips just curved up into a perfectly crooked grin.

"Worth it", was all Lyra said to him.

The class went on relatively uneventfully after that, well after Snape dried Draco off with a spell and put all the unused cauldrons away somewhere Lyra wouldn't be able to get at them. He apparently didn't trust her around anything that could be turned into a weapon. That was quite smart of him.

They all left the classroom at the end of class like they were being chased by a herd of rampaging hypogriffs. Lyra couldn't get out of there fast enough. Her and Harry dashed up the stairs and into the entrance hall. It was only then she remembered that Snape had told her he'd take points off her if she attacked Draco with a cauldron. He hadn't actually done so as far as she could tell.

She looked over her shoulder at the enormous hour glasses filled with crystals with each house's colour that were used to keep track of house points. The number written across the bottom was the same as it had been before they went down to potions. As she watched five more little red crystals dropped down into the bottom and the number went up again. She frowned at it.

Harry dragged her away from her staring and up to the common room to meet up with Fred and George. They found them sitting by the fireplace playing around with a flaming cricket ball they found in Filch's office earlier that week. Don't worry the flames don't set anything else on fire, or burn people. None of them have a clue how that is, but oh well. Who cares? Lyra caught it just before George could and flopped down onto the couch beside his seat. Harry sat down beside her feet and let out a relieved sigh.

"So potions went well?" Fred asked.

"Just fucking great", Lyra said sarcastically.

"That bad?" George asked.

"Yeah", Harry sighed, "Lyra's even gotten herself detention tomorrow after dinner out of it".

"Ouch", George laughed.

"What did you do?" Fred asked.

"Threw a cauldron full of water on Draco Malfoy's head", she told them simply, "But in my defence, he was asking for it".

"Oh, cheer up. Snape gives us detentions all the time", George said snatching the cricket ball back from her.

"And takes points from us", Fred added.

"That too", George agreed.

"Aren't you two going down to Hagrid's?" Fred asked after a short lapse in the conversation.

"Yeah, we're to go down at around three", Harry told them.

"Can we come with you?" George asked.

"Really? You want to come?" Lyra asked back looking surprised. The twins shrugged.

"We've got nothing better to do today", Fred said.

"Until you-know-what of course", George clarified.

"Fine then", Lyra and Harry agreed.

They left the common room at five to three and made their out of the castle and across the grounds to Hagrid's. The game keeper lived in a small wooden house on the very edge of the Forbidden Forest. He always left a crossbow and a pair of galoshes outside his front door. Harry knocked on the door and Lyra heard a frantic scrambling commence from inside and several booming barks echoed around them. She could then make out Hagrid's voice saying

"_Back_, Fang – _back_", and his big bearded face appeared as he pulled the door open, "Hang on" he said to them before his face disappeared again, "_Back_ Fang!"

He let them in after that, still struggling to keep hold of Fang's, his enormous black boarhound, of Hagrid's house was made up of only one, albeit very large, room. He always had hams and pheasants hanging from the ceiling. There was a copper kettle boiling over the open fire, as there always was when Hagrid was expecting someone over. In the corner there stood a massive bed with a patchwork quilt thrown over it. Lyra really liked coming to Hagrid's. It was so much simpler then Potter Manor was.

"Make yerselves at home", Hagrid said to them, letting go of Fang, who then bounded straight at Fred and started trying to lick his ears. Fang, like Hagrid, wasn't half as fierce as he looked.

"These are Fred and George", Lyra said to Hagrid, who was now pouring the tea out into a teapot the size of a large bucket and putting rock cakes onto a plate, pointing at the twins.

"The Weasley twins eh?" Hagrid said glancing up at the two boys, "I've heard a lo' 'bout wha' you two be at up at the school" the twins just grinned at him.

Hagrid poured the tea and they all sat down. Fang put his head in Harry's lap and drooled all over his robes, "How was yer firs' week?" Hagrid asked Harry and Lyra.

Harry told him all about it as Lyra pretended to be enjoying the rock cakes that nearly broke her teeth. Hagrid didn't find it strange that Harry was doing all the talking for the two of them. He did that most of the time when Lyra couldn't be bothered speaking. They knew each other so well that Harry didn't have to ask Lyra what she thought of something, he just knew, and vice versa.

The four of them were delighted to hear Hagrid call Filch "that old git" when they mentioned him, "An' as fer that cat, Mrs Norris, I'd like ter introduce her to Fang some time" he told them and the twins beamed, "D'yeh know, every time I go up ter the school, she follows me everywhere? Can't get rid of her – Filch puts her up to it".

Harry told Hagrid about Snape's lesson and he, like the twins, told both Harry and Lyra not to worry about it. He said that Snape liked hardly any of the students.

"But he really _hates _us", Harry persisted.

"That's rubbish!" Hagrid insisted, "Why should he?" but he didn't quite meet either of their eyes when he said it.

"Oh I don't know", Lyra spoke up with a roll of her eyes, "Maybe the fact that he hates our dads more than should be humanly possible and we look like little clones of them?"

"How's yer brother Charlie?" Hagrid asked as an obvious subject changer, "I liked him a lot when he was at school, great with animals".

"Oh, he's in Romania studying dragons", Fred told Hagrid.

"Really?" Hagrid asked, his face lighting up, "Blimey I've always wanted a dragon", he said wistfully.

While the twins told Hagrid all about Charlie's work in Romania Lyra picked up a piece of paper that caught her eye. She wondered as she slid it out from under the tea cosy why Hagrid had kept a cutting from the _Daily Prophet_. No one was paying attention to her at the moment, so it was the opportune moment to have a quick read through it.

_**GRINGOTS BREAK-IN LATEST**_

_Investigations continue into the break-in Gringots on 8 August, widely believed to be the work of dark wizards or witches unknown. __Gringots' goblins today insisted that nothing had been taken. The vault that was searched had in fact been emptied the same day. _

_ 'But we're not telling you what was in there, so keep your noses out if you know what's good for you', said a Gringots' spokesgoblin this afternoon. _

"Hagrid!" Lyra exclaimed all of a sudden, she had heard about the Gringots break-in alright, but no one had mentioned a date to her, "The Gringots break-in happened the day we went to Diagon Alley. It might've been happening while we were still in there!"

Hagrid definitely didn't meet her eyes that time; there was no doubt about it. He just grunted something unintelligible and offered her another rock cake. Lyra took one just to make him think his distraction had worked.

She read the article over again_. The vault that was searched had in fact been emptied the same day. _Remus had brought them with him when he emptied vault 713, if you could call taking that grubby little package empting. The vault was more than likely the most high security one up on that level. Had that scruffy little thing been what the thieves were looking for?

On their way back up to the castle for dinner, their pockets weighed down with rock cakes they'd been too polite to refuse, Lyra thought about what she'd learned from their tea with Hagrid. None of her lessons had given her half as much to think about as their tea with Hagrid had.

Had they gotten the package out of Gringots just in time? Was that even what the thieves were after? Even if it wasn't, where was it now? What was it? Who'd want to steal it?

She wondered if she'd ever be able to answer any of those questions. If she had her way, which she normally does, she would. But she was sure that Dumbledore and the rest of the authority figures in her life wouldn't be happy with her digging around.


	11. Flying, a Chase, and a Brawl

**Lyra Black and the Philosopher's Stone**

**A/N - **Hello agian lovely readers. This author's note is a lot longer than usual, but I'd appreciate it if you took the time to read it. I know it's unusual for me to update so much at once, but I'm very bored at the minute and felt it was a good idea. Also I've a few announcements to make and I thought this would be a good way to do it. First, I've hit a massive case of writer's block so I've decided to do a mini-series of one-shots for this story to get me going again. So if any of you would like me to do something in particular just take a look at Lyra Black: Friends vs. Best Friends and let me know, the help would mean a lot. And second, I'm looking for a new beta and am too impatient to go through all the profiles. So if any of you would like to take over hpfan224's place PM me please because I always need someone to make sure all of you can understand what I'm trying to put up here. Thank's for putting up with the overly long author's note. Now, on with the story.

**Chapter 11 – Flying, a Chase, and a Brawl**

Lyra had been having a really good time at Hogwarts and didn't think anything could ruin her good mood. Until she spotted a notice pinned up on the common room notice board the Tuesday after her visit with Hagrid. Flying lessons would be starting on Thursday. And if that wasn't bad enough Gryffindor and Slytherin would be learning together.

She wanted to punch whoever came up with that oh-so-wonderful idea. Did they not get that Gryffindor and Slytherin would never get on? And did that idiot not understand that they were only making things a lot more dangerous by adding flying brooms into the mix?

"Typical", she said as her and Harry stared at it.

"Yeah", he agreed, "Just what I've always wanted. To make a complete arse out of myself on a broom in front of Malfoy".

"You won't make a fool of yourself", Lyra told him, "I know Draco's always going on about how good he is at Quidditch, but I know for a fact that you could fly rings around anyone".

"Sure Ly", Harry said sarcastically, "You haven't even touched a broom since you were seven. How would you know?"

"I listen to dad when he's yelling at Quidditch matches, and I do pay attention to the ones him and Moony have taken us to", she answered him.

"Oh".

Lyra was glad to find that her and Harry weren't the only first years thoroughly depressed by that announcement. Most of the Gryffindor first years complained about it nearly constantly until Thursday came around. None of them wanted to have to practise flying with the Slytherins. A few of them didn't trust the Slytherins not to jinx their brooms, but Lyra thought that was going a bit far. After all they were first years just like they were.

She also found out that she wasn't the only one who'd never been on a broom in her life, excluding the incident when she was younger. Neville had never been allowed near a broomstick in his life, because his Gran wouldn't let him anywhere close to them. Lyra thought that his grandmother had a good reason to do so. Neville managed to have an extraordinary number of accidents when he was on his feet on level ground. Imagine what he could do on a broom. Lyra shuddered to herself at the thought.

Hermione Granger was almost as nervous about flying as Neville was, purely because flying was something you couldn't just learn out of a book. Not that she hadn't tried. She bored them all to death at breakfast on Thursday morning spouting out a bunch of useless flying tips she'd gotten from a book called Quidditch Through the Ages. Neville though was hanging on her every word, desperate for anything that might help him stay on his broom.

Lyra kept her panic to herself. And yes she was panicking. Majorly. She was still terrified of flying, no matter how much Harry and her dad tried to sooth her into trying it again. The second she held a broom she freaked. And now she was going to have to try and fly in front of half her year. That was not going to end well.

"So, first flying lesson today", George said sitting down next to Lyra. He was rubbing his hands together excitedly and nearly bouncing in his seat.

"Yeah", Harry said dejectedly, "But we've got it with the Slytherins".

"That sucks", Fred stated the obvious from the other side of Harry.

"It won't be that bad", George tried to cheer them up.

"Yeah", Fred joined his twin, "You can use the opportunity to mess with that bastard Malfoy".

"He's gonna be shocked when he sees you flying Harry", Lyra said to Harry thoughtfully, "As far as Draco knows you've got about as much experience flying as I have. None".

"You're good at flying?" George asked.

"I'm alright", Harry said modestly, going back to looking down at his plate.

"He's bloody brilliant", Lyra boasted for him, since Harry didn't seem too inclined to do so himself.

"Play Quidditch at all?" Fred asked.

"Yeah, I play with my uncle all the time", Harry nodded.

"What position?" George asked like it was a matter of life or death.

"Chaser sometimes", Harry answered, "But I play Seeker mostly", and he shoved a piece of bacon into his mouth, preventing him from answering any more of the twins' questions.

"Really?" Fred asked, "Merlin knows we need a decent Seeker this year".

"That last match against Slytherin…" George trailed off.

"Was it really that bad?" Lyra asked. She hadn't got to see that match.

"Couldn't even look at any of them for weeks later", Fred told them and George winced at the memory.

"Oooooh", Lyra said sympathetically, and then nudged Harry with her elbow "Well I can't help you, but Harry can I'm sure".

"We'll talk to Wood", George said.

"If he thinks Harry's a decent enough flyer he might be able to convince McGonagall to bend the first year rule a little", Fred said hopefully.

The post arrived then with a thunderous rush of fluttering and screeching owls looking for their owners. It had taken Lyra a few days to get used to the sheer noise that was involved with the post arriving at the school. By now it seemed pretty much normal and she wondered if it'd seem odd not hearing it every morning at breakfast during the holidays.

A small package was dropped into Neville's corn flakes across the way from them. He quickly grabbed it before the milk could ruin it and hurriedly opened it to reveal a small glass ball; it was only a bit bigger then a marble.

"It's a Remembrall" Neville explained to them all animatedly, "Gran knows I forget things – and this tells you if there's something you've forgotten to do. You've got to squeeze it in your hand like this and if the smoke stays grey then you're fine", he told them and started to squeeze the small glass ball, "but if it turns read you've forgotten something – He stopped when the smoke in the glass ball tuned scarlet. He then began trying frantically to remember what it was he'd forgotten. As he was thinking back as far as he could recall Draco passed by him and snatched the Remembrall right out of Neville's hand.

Harry jumped to his feet and was joined not even a second later by Lyra. She could tell that Harry was looking for a reason to fight Draco but Minerva, who could smell trouble faster than any other teacher in the school, was standing behind them in seconds. Lyra was for once thankful for her aunt's mostly aggravating talent. She was doubtful as to how a fight between the four of them and the four Slytherins would end up. Well she knew that they'd beat the hell out of them, but she didn't even want to think about the amount of detentions with Filch they'd get for it.

"Is there a problem?" Minerva asked them suspiciously.

"Malfoy took my Remembrall Professor", Neville told her from his chair.

Draco scowled at him and dropped the Remembrall back onto the table carelessly, "Just looking", he said arrogantly and stalked away after Gabriel Riddle, who had rolled his eyes, nudged Draco and walked off when Minerva appeared. The walking mountains followed them dumbly.

"That arsehole", Harry seethed as they sat back down, and when their aunt was safely out of earshot, "I'd love to give him a good old kick up the arse".

"I'm not denying that he badly needs one", Fred cut in, "But maybe you should be a little less obvious about it".

"Yeah, then maybe you can get away with it scott free too", George added.

"Good point", Harry grumpily allowed.

oOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

At half past three that afternoon the first year Gryffindors reluctantly left the castle and headed out into the grounds for their first flying lesson. It was a bright, clear and breezy day and the grass rippled under Lyra's feet as she walked with Harry to where they'd be having their lesson. Harry pointed out idly that it was a perfect day for Quidditch. Lyra told him he could jump off the astronomy tower if he thought she was going to play with him.

The Slytherins were already there waiting when they arrived. Lyra ignored them and looked around at the twenty or so brooms that were lined up on the ground. She hadn't believed half of what Fred and George said about the school brooms until she saw them for herself.

The twins complained to her and Harry just yesterday about them. According to the older boys some of the brooms started vibrating if you flew too high, and there was one or two that always flew slightly to the left. She really hoped she didn't get any of the defective brooms; she'd have enough trouble without more problems added onto her already long list. In fact, the school should really think about getting some new ones.

Their Flying Instructor, Madame Hooch, arrived soon after they did. She was the woman Dumbledore had pointed out at the feast, something to do with Quidditch tryouts or whatever. Lyra wasn't really listening then. She was a tall woman with short blackish-grey hair and her sharp golden brown eyes looked even more hawk-like up close.

"Well what are you all waiting for?" she barked at them as she approached, "Everyone step up to a broom. Come on now, hurry up"

Lyra instantly didn't like her. She could tell the woman was far too enthusiastic about flying for her tastes. She could put up with Harry and the twins being like that, because she could easily tell them to fuck off if they tried to get her involved. But a teacher….she'd rather keep on breathing at the minute.

She grimaced and stepped up to her broom and stared down at it. She could definitely see now what Fred and George were whinging about. Even their own ancient brooms looked like they were in better shape than this one. This one looked to be about twenty years older than theirs. Some of the twigs stuck out of the tail at odd and alarming angles. There was a chunk or two missing from it here and there. She really didn't like the look of it.

"Stick out your right hand over your broom and say UP!" she instructed and the knots in Lyra's stomach jolted unpleasantly.

_Its okay_, she said to herself, _it's not like I'm gonna go into the air by picking it up. I'd have to be really fucking unlucky for that to happen_.

"UP!" all the first years present shouted. All of them but Lyra. She just stared at the broom warily and glanced over at Harry. His broom leapt up into his hand right away and he looked over at her with a huge grin on his face.

"Go on Ly, at least try", he tried to convince her, "It's not gonna hurt you".

"Says you", Lyra said uncertainly eyeing the broom in his hand.

She looked around at the rest of the class in time to see Draco's broom leap into his hand just like Harry's did, and Hermione's just roll over on the ground. The clever brunette looked absolutely frantic.

She noticed Neville's broom hadn't even moved an inch yet. She caught his eye and pointed to hers which was in a similar way to his. He smiled at her. He tried again, but his voice had a waver in it that said all too clearly that he'd much rather stay on the ground. Lyra honestly didn't blame him. She felt the exact same at the moment.

Harry had told her a while ago that he thought brooms were a little like horses in the way they could tell if you were scared of them. She dismissed his theory as rubbish when he told her. But now, watching the other first years surrounding her struggle with the brooms Lyra couldn't help but think that Harry might've been onto something after all.

"Are you sure you're not even going to try?" Harry asked her after watching her alternate between staring at the broom with an expression of disgust and watching their classmates for about five minutes.

"Yup", was all she said to him and crossed her arms stubbornly over her chest.

"You're gonna get Madame Hooch pissed at you if you don't", he warned.

"Do I care?" she asked and Harry sighed. There really was no arguing with her when she got something into her mind.

"Ly go on", Harry persisted, "If you don't I'll…. I'll flush your stink pellets down the toilet" he threatened and Lyra sized him up.

"You wouldn't".

"Try me".

She huffed angrily. He was serious. Damn it.

"Fine then" she gave in, he knew her far too well for her own good. She sighed and lazily stretched her hand our over the broom and unenthusiastically said, "Up", at it. She waited a few seconds for it to do something, anything, but nothing happened. She turned back to Harry, "Happy now?" she asked.

"No", he said back frowning at her.

Madame Hooch started going around then to correct their grips. Lyra bent down and picked up the broom, pretending that she'd done what the rest of the class had. Harry sent her a withering look.

"Oh shut up Harry, you knew class would go like this", she said to him as Hooch was helping Ron Weasley.

She waited; bored out of her mind, while Madame Hooch went around, for the woman to give them their next instructions so Lyra could pretend to try to do them. The sooner she did, the sooner she could get out of there.

"Now, when I blow my whistle I want you all to kick off hard" she ordered them walking up and down the rows of students, eyeing them critically, "Keep your brooms steady, raise up a few feet and then come straight back down again by leaning forward slightly", she stopped behind Lyra and Harry. Lyra roared curses at the teacher in her mind and Harry sent her a smug look.

"On my whistle – one – two –"

She never got to three. Neville, bless him, was jumpy and nervous and kicked off before the whistle. He shot up into the air like a Muggle bullet out of a gun. He was totally out of control of the broom.

"Come back boy!" Madame Hooch shouted after him, but it wouldn't do any good. Couldn't she see that Neville couldn't come back no matter how much he wanted to right then? It was obvious from the ground that Neville had completely lost control of the broom and was now hanging on for dear life. He looked terrified. Lyra wondered briefly if that's what she looked like last time she was on a broom.

Neville was about twenty feet up when Lyra saw him look down at the rest of them and gasp in shock. He let go of the handle, distracted, and slipped sideways off his broom. Lyra winced as she watched him plummet to the ground.

His broom kept going even after he fell. It went higher and higher, then started to drift off into the Forbidden Forest and out of sight. That must've been one of the ones that veered to the left all the time.

Everyone was frozen in shock and Lyra didn't know what to do. What did her dad and uncle try to do to help her? She couldn't remember. She knew falling off a broom was never good, especially from so high up. From what she could tell if Neville was lucky he'd break something. If he wasn't they wouldn't be seeing him out of the hospital wing for a few weeks.

Neville crashed to the ground with a sickening CRACK seconds later and landed hard in a heap on the grass. Madame Hooch finally unfroze herself and ran over to Neville to see if he was okay.

"A broken wrist", Lyra heard her mutter to herself. Lyra hoped Neville would be alright. Falling from brooms was painful shit. "Come on boy, it's alright, up you get now".

She faced the rest of the class sternly once Neville was standing, "I'm taking him to the hospital wing, if anyone goes so much as a foot of the ground while I'm gone will be expelled before they can say Quidditch".

Her threat was left hanging in the air as she left with Neville, who was whimpering in pain the whole way up to the castle. Madame Hooch was just out of sight when a group of the Slytherins burst out into laughter. Lyra turned to scowl at them.

"Did you see his face?" Draco asked and almost all the remaining Slytherins joined in the laughter, "The big lump".

"Oh shut up you lot", snapped Parvati Patil, one of Lyra's dorm mates.

"Ooh, sticking up for Longbottom Parvati?" asked a pug-like girl nastily. Lyra thought her name was Pansy or something. "I didn't think you'd like whiny little cry babies", she sneered looking as though she just swallowed a lemon.

"How about I drop you from twenty feet in the air and see what you do Pansy", Lyra interjected giving the girl a threatening look. Lyra had the satisfaction of seeing a flicker of fear in the older girl's eyes before she regained her composure enough to respond.

"How could you, you can't even get your broom off the ground!" she nearly shouted across at Lyra thinking she had won. But that'd just made Lyra very angry. Everyone looked at her with raised eyebrows.

So she stuck her hand out over a broom that someone – possibly her – had dropped and without a word it shot up into her hand. Pansy took a step back

"Just try me Pansy", she said with a heated glare. In her mind there was a voice shouting at her to use the broom to bash in Pansy's skull, and another screeching for her to drop the broom, burn it, or get rid of it however she could.

"Look", Draco said just then, darting forward and snatching something off the grass, "It's that stupid thing Longbottom's Gran sent him", he announced holding up Neville's Remembrall for everyone to see.

"Give it here Malfoy", Harry demanded, stepping forward and giving Draco a hard look. Draco just smiled nastily at him.

"Don't think so", he replied, "I think I'll leave it somewhere for him to find, like up a tree maybe".

"I said give it here!" Harry said looking like he was about to go into a rage that could almost rival one of Lyra's, but Draco had already hopped onto his broom and taken off over the forest.

He hadn't been lying before, he could fly well. But he was being an idiot, he was no match for Harry, who was now mounting his broom to chase him, and his bodyguards were all the way down on the ground, with her to deal with. They without a doubt weren't going to be coming to his rescue any time soon.

"Don't, you'll get us all in trouble!" a voice yelled at him and both he and Lyra turned to find that the source of it was, of course, Hermione Granger, "You heard what Madame Hooch said" she continued but Lyra cut her off.

"Haven't you heard Hermione, we were born to cause trouble", she turned back to Harry then, "Kick his arse", glaring up at her – ugh – cousin.

"Come and get it Potter", Draco taunted from the air and that was it for Harry, there was no backing out now. Harry took off even faster than Neville had gone, but the difference was that Harry was in total control of the broom. He was going so fast that he was a black blur.

Lyra's attention was diverted from what Harry and her cousin were doing by the troll/humans turning to her with huge, ugly grins on their faces. They looked down at her like she was a half dead deer lying in front of a grizzly bear and cracked their knuckles in what Lyra supposed they thought was a threatening manner.

"Looks like the blood traitor's all alone", the bigger one of the two said, she couldn't remember which one was which

"So that's what this's all about huh?" she asked, "Too afraid to take on anyone other than a girl less than half your size then?"

They both growled at her and she just smirked at them. Stepping away from the other Gryffindors she motioned them toward her with her hand. They just stood there for a moment, looking at her in total confusion.

"If you wanna fight, then fight", she challenged them and everyone around her gasped in surprise, "Come on" she egged the two trolls on, "I'm just a scrawny little girl after all, isn't that right boys?"

The way she was acting so confident in challenging them had thrown them for a little bit, but now Crabbe and Goyle were getting angry. Their eyes were narrowed and their nostrils flaring furiously. She sent them another cocky grin and laughed at them. They'd had enough at that and charged at her.

As the two lumps of muscle ran at her Lyra felt adrenaline start to pound through her system, she felt as though her veins were on fire. It was the most intense, wonderful, _savage_ sensation she had ever experienced. It felt indescribably amazing. Her muscles were tensed ready to spring into action and her mind was focused on her two opponents unwaveringly. She was smiling to herself in an almost maniacal way. In her mind they were as good as done for already.

Lyra no longer felt like herself. She felt like the primal, animalistic side of herself that always wanted to get out in times of stress and anger. The side that caused all her magical accidents. She was finally letting it out to play. She started to see red as they neared her. She felt lighter than air, stronger then stone and faster than lightning. She saw their every move as if they were in slow motion and her brain was going at triple speed. And suddenly she knew exactly what to do.

The first one, she remembered he was Crabbe now, took the first swing at her. She moved out of the way of his fist easily and grabbed onto his arm before he could pull it back. She jerked it more toward herself, knocking him off balance and then took the opportunity to pull herself up using his weight to counter hers. She aimed a kick with both her legs at his chest and put as much force as she could behind it. She hit him right in the breast bone and winded him. He fell backwards onto the flat of his back and Lyra landed on top of him. She jumped off him and ducked the blow aimed at her head by Goyle.

They just kept coming at her, but Lyra never tired. Never faltered. She kept ducking, dodging and hitting them at the same pace as she started. This pattern of fighting continued for a few minutes until Lyra could find a proper opening to take them down. She dodged their punches, and hit the two of them every chance she could see. She even managed to set it up so that the punched each other right in the face instead of her.

Lyra was a lot smaller than them, which should've been a disadvantage, but she turned it against them. Her size meant she was a smaller target, and that she was able to move a lot quicker than them and fit in and out of gaps neither of them could dream of getting through. She used that to her advantage fully.

Crabbe threw a punch straight for her face again with a grunt of effort. While his arm was extended Lyra shot up from her crouch and landed as many hits as she could under his arm and on his chest as fast as she could. Once that was done she ducked around him and side kicked him square in the arse. He fell forward onto his face with a 'thud'.

Crabbe started to get up almost right away so Lyra whirled around in time to dodge out of the way of another fist and then a leg. She caught his foot and used it to push him back onto his arse once again. When he fell she pulled back her arm and landed a right hook on his face. Not even a full second after that she hit him again with her left, whacking him with all the power she could generate in the nose. A sickening crack was heard and his nose gushed blood. He started to yell out a string of profanities that Lyra didn't hear because she was busy whacking him in the head again. This one knocked him out cold.

She turned around to face Goyle again as Crabbe fell to the ground, limp. He was staring at her like she'd killed the other boy. She didn't put it past the moron to believe she did actually murder Crabbe in front of all those witnesses. He started to back away, but Lyra was a lot quicker than him and darted forward to stop him. She swung her leg back and kicked him right in the balls. He collapsed to the ground in pain and she swung her other leg around so that it collided with the back of his head. He was out after that too.

She turned to look at the rest of the Slytherins with a raised eyebrow, "Anyone else want to try and teach the blood traitor a lesson?"

"What the bloody hell do you think you're doing?" a voice roared from behind her. She spun around and punched the speaker in the face with enough force to knock them off their feet; they evidently hadn't expected the attack.

Gabriel Riddle caught and steadied Draco before he could hit the ground, holding back a grin, "That's her two, you zero Drake", he told his friend with a low chuckle.

It hit Lyra as she started to calm down from her battle-high that if Draco was back on the ground, then where the fuck was Harry? She looked up to the sky to find Harry racing into a dive after something she assumed to be Neville's Remembrall. Everyone else seemed to notice this at the same time as her. People screamed as he neared the ground. Lyra jumped on the spot shouted encouragements up at him, even though she knew he probably couldn't hear her over the wind. She wasn't totally down from her adrenaline rush just yet.

Harry stretched out his hand and caught it about a foot above the ground. He pulled the broom up just in time to stop himself crashing into the ground at however many miles an hour. He toppled gently from the broom and landed lightly on the grass with the Remembrall clutched safely in his fist and he let out a booming laugh in victory.

"HARRY POTTER!" Lyra heard a roar that could only belong to Minerva McGonagall. It was shortly followed by, "LYRA BLACK!"

Lyra turned her head reluctantly to see her aunt charging towards them looking fit to kill someone, most likely her or Harry at the moment. Lyra could almost see steam pouring out of her ears like in Muggle cartoons.

"What do you think you're doing!" she yelled at them, "Never – in all my years at Hogwarts – how dare you!"

"They were provoked professor", one of the Gryffindors interjected, trying to defend them both.

"I don't want to hear it Mr Finnegan", Minerva said sternly.

"But it wasn't their fault professor!", Ron Weasley tried to say.

"Enough Mr Weasley", Minerva interrupted him, "Both of you follow me, now!" she turned on her heel and Lyra and Harry shared a look behind her back as they followed her back up to the castle. It was their 'we're fucked now' look.

Lyra knew they were both going to be in serious trouble over this. Though the more she thought about it the more she realised that she'd get in a lot more shit over what she did then Harry would. Hogwarts was very strict about duelling, Muggle brawling and public rioting.

Minerva led them through the castle in silence. Not once did she turn back to look at them even. Lyra knew the castle well enough by now thanks to the twins and the map, so she knew from the way her aunt was leading them that they were heading in the opposite direction to her office. Lyra's first thought after that was that maybe her aunt was taking them to Dumbledore. But that idea was scrapped when Minerva took a turn that would take them to a different corner of the castle altogether. Where was she taking them?

Lyra looked over to Harry again, he looked nervous enough to shit a brick right then. She was nervous too. If her dad found she'd been fighting with guys three times her size he wouldn't be very pleased. He'd told her the day before she left for school not to get into anything too serious with the older kids, or outnumbered, and that she was to stick with Harry if she was in trouble. Well that plan's gone down the toilet now because she'd technically just done both without a second thought. The bright side was that she didn't think they'd be giving her any trouble in the foreseeable future when they got back from the hospital wing.

Lyra doubted her dad would see it like that, at first anyway. His instinct when it came to her was to flip out the second she was in any sort of trouble and get rid of whatever was threatening her using any means necessary, and only ask questions when he'd calmed down a couple hours later. Even so, she was still more curious as to what her aunt was thinking then she was worried about what her dad would do when he was told about all this.

He couldn't really give out to her much about it anyway because she knew for a fact that he'd gotten into more than his fair share of fights and duels when he was at Hogwarts. He hated hypocrites so if she brought that up he'd just tell her to be more careful and a bunch of shit like that, which he'd know she wasn't going to even think about doing. Well, he'd tell her all that after he'd been restrained from tearing Crabbe and Goyle to shreds.

It was a little while later that Lyra realised where her aunt Min was taking them. They were going down the corridor where they had DADA with her uncle Moony. But why the hell would she be taking them to Moony?

Minerva knocked on the door as Lyra wondered what they fuck she was thinking and it opened on its own, "Sorry interrupt professor Lupin" she began politely, "But may I borrow Wood for a moment?"

Lyra frowned in confusion. First what were they doing at Moony's classroom, and second who or what the hell was 'wood'? As it turned out Wood was a burly looking fifth year boy, who looked just as perplexed about what was going on as Lyra and Harry were. He shot the two of them a confused look or two, and one that appeared to ask 'you two got a clue what's going on?' To that last one Lyra just shrugged.

Minerva led the three of them back down the corridor and into a classroom that was empty and quite except for Peeves, who was writing some very colourful swear words on the black board and cackling away to himself.

"Out Peeves", Minerva barked at him.

The poltergeist spun around to face then and smiled out of pure and total glee, "Oooo!" he squealed, "Is little Lyra Black-Sheep getting into trouble again?" he asked her with a barking cackle.

See, unlike most students at the school Lyra got along very well with the poltergeist. So did Harry, most of the time. He helped them out with a few of their pranks when they had to split up from the twins. He was over the moon with joy when he found out she was so like her dad. Sirius had gotten on quite well with Peeves during his school days.

"I said out Peeves", Minerva said again and Peeves threw the chalk he was using into the bin and flew through the wall laughing to himself the whole way.

"Harry, Lyra, this is Oliver Wood", Minerva introduced them to the fifth year, but that didn't clear up any of why they were there in the first place, "He's the captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch team" she continued, and Lyra was still confused. She then turned to Wood, looking absolutely ecstatic, "Wood I've found you a Seeker", she told him waving a hand at Harry.

"Really professor?" he asked sounding shocked, but just as thrilled as Minerva did.

"Yes, he caught that thing in his hand after an over fifty-foot dive", she told Wood, her voice brimming with pride, "Charlie Weasley couldn't have done it".

Wood beamed at Harry, "Have you ever played Quidditch before Potter?" he asked urgently.

"A bit yeah", Harry answered.

"Excellent", he said as he began to circle around Harry, "He's built like a Seeker too. Light, speedy", he said approvingly to himself.

"We need a better team than last year", Minerva commented dryly, "Flattened in that last match by Slytherin. I couldn't look Severus Snape in the eye for weeks after".

_Alright_, Lyra allowed, _maybe that last match really was that bad_.

"He'll need a good broom too professor", Wood said now that he'd stopped circling Harry, "I'd say a Cleansweep 7 or a Nimbus 2000".

"I'll talk to professor Dumbledore and see if we can bend the first year rule just this once", she agreed with a nod, "Now as for you, young lady", her tone became suddenly murderous again as she rounded on Lyra, "What on earth were you thinking engaging in Muggle duelling with three boys, two of whom were a least about four times your size?"

Okay, Lyra may have underestimated their size just a little, or overestimated hers. Both were very likely. What was also very likely, though, was that her aunt was over exaggerating to help prove her point.

"I'm sure there's a perfectly logical explanation for that", Lyra told her uneasily. Her aunt just raised her eyebrows at her.

"Well then I'd love to hear it".

"Just gimme a minute", she said to Minerva, "and I'll think of one".

"No, Ms Black, I won't give you a minute to come up with an excuse", Minerva told her pursing her lips, "What gives you the right to send three other students to the hospital wing? I wouldn't be surprised if Mr Crabbe's nose was broken, or if Mr Goyle was concussed. What do you have to say for yourself?" she fumed looking like she was getting ready to start breathing fire.

"I regret nothing", was all Lyra said, giving up on excuses altogether.

"Fine then, you have a week's detention with me and fifteen points will be taken from Gryffindor", she told her, "I would give you more if I weren't so glad it isn't you being levitated off to the hospital wing. Just know that I will be informing your father about this as soon as possible".

"Can't you just not tell him?" Lyra asked cautiously.

"No I most certainly cannot", Minerva answered her sharply. Lyra groaned to herself and wondered how long it'd be before her dad barged into the school ready to kill someone over this.

"You are all free to go now", she announced and Harry and Lyra fled from the room. In Harry's case before she could change her mind about punishing him. And in Lyra's in case before she decided to give her more detentions after all. They were closely followed by Wood, who gave them a nod and headed back to his classroom.

"That was crazy", Harry said when they decided that they'd gotten far enough away from their aunt.

"Tell me about it", Lyra said sighing heavily.

They walked back up to the common room in silence, neither one of them cared enough to go back to their flying lesson as they were very likely supposed to. When they arrived in the cosy circular room they threw themselves down in their favourite armchairs. No one else was in the common room at the minute, everyone was in classes.

Lyra turned to face Harry, "I didn't see most of what happened in the air, I was sort of busy with the dunderheads" she said and laughed to herself at their faces, and the memory of the rush, "What happened?"

Harry laughed and started to tell his story, starting from when he took off into the air and finishing with his spectacular catch. He'd seen enough of what was happening back on the ground to guess what had happened between Lyra, Crabbe and Goyle. He asked her to tell him her version of events anyway. He didn't have a clue what started it all, but was clutching his sides laughing when Lyra told him what the two troll wannabes thought they'd be able to get away with.


	12. The Midnight Duel

**Lyra Black and the Philosopher's Stone**

**A/N** - Hellooo again everyone. I'm sorry it's been so long since my last update, myself and my new beta jamber17 have just been sorting a few things out and what not. Anyway, I'm back because you can't keep a crazed fan down! So I'd like to thank jamber 17 who looked at this chapter for me, hpfan224 who looked at it first, and everyone who's read this far and reviewed. So anyhoo... on with the chapter!

**Chapter 12 – The Midnight Duel**

News of Lyra's brawl with Crabbe, Goyle and Draco spread very quickly through the students and teachers, even by Hogwarts standards. And that was fast. The school was famous for its rumour mill. By the time all the students were out of classes for the day everyone in the castle knew that a skinny little first year had beat up two huge Slytherins. And when the Gryffindors finally found Lyra and Harry sitting up in the common room they erupted into cheers and roars of delight.

Lyra and Harry didn't have a clue what had been going on since they entered the common room, so it was a massive shock to them. Lyra fell off the couch she and Harry were sitting on in surprise, and Harry knocked over the lamp on the table next to them when he flailed around to see what was going on.

"What the bloody hell is going on?" Lyra asked as she stood up again and stared at the crowd that had gathered.

"You kicked Slytherin arse that's what!" George yelled at her after he and Fred emerged at the front of the hoard of red and gold clad students.

"You showed them who's boss around here!" Fred chimed in, applauding along with his twin and the rest of the Gryffindors who were all squeezed into the common room.

"You sure stuck it to 'em Black!" someone in the back yelled and everyone started cheering again.

"You've got to love the Hogwarts gossips", Harry said to Lyra with an innocent smile. She rolled her eyes at him.

"Yeah they're just fantastic", she shot back sarcastically.

"And you all know what this means", the twins said together. Everyone stopped and looked at them expectantly.

They ducked back into the crowd momentarily and emerged again with their friend Lee Jordan and a supply of Butterbeers, food, Firewhiskey, sweets and other drinks that they stole from the kitchens.

"PARTY!" the three yelled to the delight of everyone in the room

Within minutes the common room looked like what you'd expect the inside of a night club to be like. There was music loud enough to kill your ears, enough food and drinks to get a small country through a drought and a famine. And with all the entertainment provided by the twins no one was bored for a second. The celebrations went on for the rest of the evening, and well into the night. The music and chatter got steadily louder and louder and the older students got gradually more and more pissed out of their skulls.

Surprisingly, well Lyra was surprised at least, not a single one of the teachers came to tell them to shut up and stop what they were doing. Lyra supposed they couldn't be bothered trying, they knew it would be useless to stop the Gryffindors when they were set on making as much noise as humanly possible. They weren't known as Hogwarts' 'Party House' for nothing after all.

As it started to get darker the twins decided to break out the really fun stuff. They set of fireworks that zoomed around over people's heads and exploded in a bright shower of sparks and charmed the lamps and ceiling lights to flash different colours. Drunk people started dancing along to the music blaring out from the old stereo, all their inhibitions long forgotten, and those who were still sober – meaning the third years and below – weren't long following them thinking it might be fun. And their harmless, well relatively harmless, dancing ended up turning into some sort of rave.

Lyra supposed that was what made her aunt decide she'd finally had enough, because she barged into the common room at half past four the next morning and with an angry flourish of her wand put out the music.

"That is enough!" she barked at them, "Go to bed and if you start this up again you'll all be on detention until the end of term", she threatened.

Some of the more inebriated students tried to argue with her, but they were quickly hushed and/or restrained by their friends. Everyone knew she was deadly serious about putting them all on detention for however long she wanted. Never, ever mess with Minerva McGonagall's sleep, it's not worth it.

Lyra was herded upstairs quickly by the prefects along with the rest of her classmates. She was quite disappointed that her aunt had spoiled her fun. She was just about to convince the twins to run through the dungeons dressed as fairies. But it wasn't totally unexpected Lyra reasoned. And she could get them to do it next time.

She changed for bed with the rest of the girls in her dorm, letting out a jaw-breaking yawn. Her sleepiness was finally catching up to her now and she felt exhausted. It was like all her limbs were filled with lead and her brain was going only an eighth of the speed it normally worked at.

She crawled into bed and pulled the hangings shut behind her to try and discourage the other girls annoying her. She always did this whenever she was in the dorm. The only time Lyra actually spent in there was when she was sleeping. The rest of the day was spent hanging around with Harry and the twins. She didn't think she'd ever even spoken to any of the girls in her year yet.

Lyra banished the thoughts of her own antisocial behaviour from her mind and let herself drift off to sleep. She was so tired she thought she'd sleep the whole night through no problem. As usual, she was very wrong.

She spent the night tossing and turning, and mumbling incoherently to herself in her sleep. Her face normally looked peaceful and as childlike as it was supposed to look but that night though she looked troubled and afraid.

After Lyra slipped into unconsciousness she started to dream. At least, she thought she was dreaming. It was hard for her to tell. Although she didn't think any place like where she was now could exist outside of her imagination. She found herself standing in the middle of a dark room. There were flaming torches lit around the walls, but they didn't give much light to the chamber. It was stiflingly hot all around her, but Lyra felt cold. Freezing cold.

She knew she wasn't alone, but whoever was there with her hadn't shown them self yet. They were hiding in the shadows that engulfed patches of the room that the torches' glow couldn't reach. This made Lyra extremely uncomfortable. She could feel the creature's eyes watching her calculatingly but she couldn't see them herself.

"Show yourself!" she called out into the darkness, but she received no reply, and no one stepped into the light, "Are you afraid of me? Is that it?" she asked her opponent tauntingly. Again nothing happened.

"Who are you?" she asked not expecting an answer.

Only silence preceded her question once again. The only response she received to let her know that whatever was watching her heard what she said was that the room got hotter and hotter, as whatever it was got angrier and angrier at her. Lyra spun around on the spot trying to catch a glimpse of _something_, anything at all that would tell her where she was. It was painfully familiar. But for the life of her she couldn't put her finger on where she'd seen this place before.

After who knows how long, it could've been minutes or hours Lyra couldn't tell, an idea suddenly came into Lyra's head. It was a strange one, but for some reason she knew she was right. It felt right. So she spoke before she could think through what she was about to say.

"Alal", she breathed out.

It was barely a whisper but the response was like she's roared it out at the creature. The torches flared blinding white and the entire room lit up. She now knew why she recognised the room. It looked almost exactly like her room at Potter Manor... only different.

The walls and floors of this room were made of deep grey stones. Wooden torches were hanging from the walls, still ablaze with white hot flames it hurt to look at. The bed looked exactly the same; it was even in the same place. The dresser and wardrobe were too. The biggest difference was that this room had no windows, the only light came from the torches on the walls. And there was something carved into the floor, some kind of symbol, and she was standing right in the middle of it.

Lyra sensed something moving behind her and she whirled around only to come face to face with the thing that'd been observing her. She wasn't even a foot away from it. She tried to back away from it, but she found that her limbs were paralysed. She couldn't even let out a scream.

Alal didn't look anything like she did in Lyra's memory. The demon that stood almost nose to nose with Lyra, and looked almost completely identical to her, yet completely opposite of her too.

The demon was even paler then she was. Instead of inky black and curly, her hair was snowy white and pin straight. Her eyes were a deep crimson colour, with steaks of black running from just outside her pupil through her irises. Her face looked sharper, more animalistic. Her lips were as red as her eyes, and they were pulled back into a feral grin that showed off her sharp, pearly white teeth.

The strangest thing about the demon's appearance was that along her skin were red lines that looked like they were following the path of her major blood vessels. At first Lyra thought they were painted on using some kind of makeup. Then she looked closer and began to think they were tattoos. But that didn't fit either. They were a part of the demon, not something artificially added to her. She didn't know what they were. The symbols that kept on popping up everywhere Lyra looked now days were woven into the lines elegantly.

Alal was wearing something that Lyra recognised. As far as she knew she was draped in the cloak and flowing, beautiful dress of a high priestess, from back in ancient times where magical society was still organised in covens and circles. The dress stood out against the demon's skin because it was a startling shade of crimson, matching her eyes perfectly, and embellished in gold. Her cloak was the deepest black Lyra had ever seen. They made her skin look as if it was glowing like a full moon.

Lyra's limbs finally regained the ability to move and she stumbled away from the frightening creature. As she did that the demon started to laugh at her. Her voice echoed around the room and assault Lyra's ears. It was cold, twisted and made Lyra feel hollow inside.

She started to follow Lyra as she backed away towards the door she'd spotted earlier. Lyra never took her eyes off the demon, whose unnatural grin got wider as she pursued the young girl and a wild glint shone in her eyes. That was a mistake on Lyra's part. She tripped over something on the floor and toppled over onto her back, totally defenceless. Alal took advantage of Lyra's slip up and leapt onto the girl, pinning her to the ground easily.

Lyra struggled to get away from her attacker, but it was useless. Alal laughed at her again, bearing her teeth threateningly. The demon leaned down so her face was only an inch away from Lyra's.

"You can't run from me forever damu ", she whispered.

Lyra didn't get to see what the demon was going to do or say next because just as Alal pulled away from her and raised her hand Lyra felt a pull in her mind and she was roughly yanked from unconsciousness.

She woke up with a violent start and was met with the sight of bushy curls trying to shake her awake desperately. When her mind caught up to what was happening, realising that she was no longer wherever Alal had taken her, she was able to focus on the body attached to the curls. Hermione was saying something Lyra wasn't paying attention to because Alal's smooth, icy cold voice was still ringing in her ears. What the hell was going on?

Lyra tuned into what Hermione was saying in time to hear the end of, what seemed to be as far as Lyra could tell, a very long, quickly spoken rant, "…get Madame Pomfrey".

"No!" Lyra yelled at her sitting up ram-rod straight and grabbing the other girl's arms just as she was about to walk away.

"What?" Hermione asked turning back to face her.

"Don't you dare get Madame Pomfrey", Lyra warned the girl.

"But you're bleeding!" she screeched, looking wide eyed at the blood that was flowing freely from Lyra's once again open scars. Lyra glanced down at them too fleetingly.

"That doesn't matter", she insisted urgently, "You can't get her, or my aunt!"

"Who?" Hermione asked confused, "You need to get them healed!"

"I can take care of them!" Lyra shouted at the stubborn girl, "Just stay out of this! And don't mention it to a single soul".

"But you were screaming nonsense…and trashing around…and you could die of blood loss!" Hermione tried to reason with the younger girl.

"No I won't, like I said, I can take care of myself. So don't you open your mouth to anyone about this. If you do I swear to Merlin…" Lyra threatened the other Gryffindor. She must've looked terrifying as she did, because Hermione backed down right away.

Lyra then let go of the bushy haired girl and rushed into the bathroom to try and take care of her scars. She cleaned away the blood so she could wrap them or try to close them up somehow. By the time she did so they were already starting to heal themselves, she had no idea how. After she cleaned herself up she headed back into the dorm room to fix her bed for the second time. When she did Hermione was nowhere to be seen. If the annoying girl was gone to tell her aunt or _anyone_ about what she'd seen Lyra didn't know what she'd do with the girl. She didn't even know what exactly the other girl _had_ seen.

Lyra sat on her bed and put her head in her hands. What was wrong with her? She was desperate to find out, but who could she go to? Who would know anything about demons?

The only person she could come up with was Ollivander. He'd known enough about them to know what demon the core of her wand was. And she had gotten the feeling that he knew something about her when she was in his shop. But he was all the way in Diagon Alley. There was no way for her to get to him without someone finding out what she was up to. And she didn't want that.

Lyra heaved out a jagged sigh and lifted her head, rubbing her temples. Her head was starting to hurt and she was feeling light-headed. Hermione was right about one thing, she had lost a lot more blood then she thought she had. Since there was nothing she could do about it now Lyra tried to forget about it and got ready to go down and meet up with Harry and the twins. She was getting much better at repressing unwanted memories.

oOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

When Harry and Lyra walked into the Great Hall everyone went quite and turned to stare at them. After that single moment the two of them were greeted with cheers from the Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Gryffindor tables and with glares and looks of pure hatred from the Slytherins. They shared a glance and walked over to sit with the twins, trying their best to ignore the people shouting things after them.

"Well done", George said in a low voice as Harry slid into the seat next to him, "Wood told us 'bout yesterday".

"We're gonna win that Quidditch cup for sure this year I tell you", Fred said from the other side of his twin, "We haven't won since Charlie left, but this year's team is gonna be brilliant", he enthused.

"You must be good Harry", George observed, "Wood was nearly skipping when he told us". Lyra tried to imagine Wood, the tough, burly fifth year skipping. She couldn't. It was just too weird a thing to try and picture.

As George finished speaking some much less welcome company turned up. Draco was once again flanked by Crabbe and Goyle as he approached them. Lyra noticed that the Riddle boy wasn't with them. Her eyes flickered to the Slytherin table momentarily. He wasn't there either.

"Having a last meal, Potter?" he asked jeeringly, "When are you getting the train back to London?"

"You're much braver now that you've got your little friends with you, back on the ground", Harry observed coolly as he turned to face them.

There was nothing little about Crabbe or Goyle, and Harry knew that perfectly well. But Harry also knew that with the High Table full of professors, that at the moment were keeping a watchful eye on them, neither boy could do any more then crack their knuckles and scowl. Lyra smirked at them and they lost their surly, tough expressions in less than a second. They took a cautious step back and Lyra's smirk grew wider.

"I'll take you on my own any time", Draco declared, "Tonight, if you're up for it. A Wizard's duel. Wands only – no contact... what's the matter Potter, never heard of a Wizard's duel?"

"Of course I have Malfoy", Harry spat at the blond.

Lyra cut in then to stop an all out fight right under the teachers' noses. Merlin didn't even know what would happen to her and Harry if they were caught at something like that a second time in less than two days.

"I'm his second, who's yours?" she asked casually.

Draco spared a glance over his shoulder at Crabbe and Goyle, both of whom were looking eager to try and have another go at Lyra. She could see from the look on Draco's face that he wanted neither of them.

"Gabriel", he said and the two behind him looked severely disappointed, "Midnight in the trophy room, that's always unlocked".

When Draco and his lackeys had left Harry looked worriedly at Lyra, "What the bloody hell am I meant to do in a duel?" he asked. Lyra shrugged.

"The most either of you'll be able to do is shoot sparks at each other, maybe try to disarm each other. Neither of you know enough to do any real damage", she tried to reassure him, "He probably expected you to refuse anyway".

"That just shows how much he knows about Gryffindors", Fred commented.

"And what if I wave my wand at him and nothing happens?" Harry asked.

"Throw it away and punch him in the nose", George advised wisely, "He'll never see that coming".

oOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

It was much later that Lyra found herself sneaking out of her dormitory to meet Harry and the twins in the common room. It was half past eleven and she'd had to wait until she was one hundred percent sure that all the other girls were asleep before she left. Ever since that morning she'd been acting extra carefully about any and all of their plans because she knew Hermione Granger was watching her all day. She looked like she wanted to confront Lyra about it again, but Lyra made sure she never got the chance.

She crept out of the room as quietly as she could because apparently this Hermione one is a light sleeper. As soon as the door was shut though she raced down the stairs to the common room and skidded to a halt right in front of her three friends.

"Ready?" she asked Harry with an excited smile.

"As I'll ever be", he answered frowning.

"Aww, is Harry nervous?" Fred cooed.

"No, now shut up!" Harry snapped back.

"We'll take that as a yes", George said smirking.

"Let's just go already", Harry huffed and threw the invisibility cloak over himself, Lyra and the twins. It only fit over all four of them because Lyra was so small that she didn't take up much room at all under the cloak.

As they moved stealthily through the corridors to the trophy room Lyra felt that they were starting to push their luck just a little. She and Harry were only finished detention for their first prank, and Snape and Filch were after them for everything they've done since then. She was in big trouble after sending three students to the hospital wing.

She could just imagine her aunt's face if they were caught out of bed at this hour. The mental image nearly had her laughing out loud, even though Filch would surely catch them if he heard her laughing. She wondered for a second if getting caught would be worth it just to see that look on her aunt Min's face. She banished that thought from her mind as soon as it came into it. Of course it wouldn't. They had their reputation as Hogwarts' undetectable pranksters to keep up after all.

They stayed perfectly silent as they flitted along through the corridors stripped with moonlight creeping in from the high windows except for George's occasional warning about Filch coming near them on his patrolling. Lyra knew that with the map on their side they couldn't possibly get caught, but her heart still nearly hammered through chest when they nearly ran into Filch for the third time. It was almost as if the old caretaker was heading to the same place as them.

When they tiptoed up the stairs and into the trophy room Draco and the Riddle boy weren't there yet. They weaved their way into the room still under the cloak. All the crystal trophies lining the walls glinted brightly where the moonlight caught them. The same light seemed to pass through Lyra and her three friends.

Cups, plates, statues and shields of all different sizes of gold and silver winked at them as the light hit them. They waited and waited. Their opponents never arrived.

Lyra kept her eyes on every door to the room; there were three that she could see, in case they tried to sneak up behind them for fun. She had a distinct feeling that wasn't their plan though. The minutes crept by and there was still no sign of them.

"They're not coming Harry", Lyra whispered as quietly as she could.

She had only finished speaking when a sudden noise made them all jump. They heard someone speaking, but it wasn't Draco or Riddle.

"Sniff around my sweet, never know where they might be trying to hide". It was Filch. And he'd brought his cat, Mrs Norris with him.

Horror struck the four pranksters looked at the map and back to where the voice had come from. They doubled back the way they'd come as quickly and quietly as they could. They had barley gotten out the door when they heard Filch enter the trophy room.

"They're in here somewhere", Lyra heard him mutter – to himself or the cat she couldn't tell – "probably hiding".

They crept down the corridor for a few minutes, Filch gaining on them the entire time. He could move a lot quicker than they could as he didn't have to be quite so worried about making noise as they did. Eventually they came to a secret door that would take them somewhere else in the castle. It was their only hope so Lyra waited until she heard Filch stop and begin muttering to his cat again and opened it using the trick torch on the wall. The door slid open and the four of them slipped through it and shoved it closed just in time. They looked at the map and saw that not even three seconds after they'd closed the door, Filch and Mrs Norris passed right by them.

Even though Filch had passed Lyra knew they couldn't risk going back that way. She led the small group on their way through the short corridor that would take them to the other end of this passage. The reason Lyra didn't like using this particular secret route was that it led somewhere different every time you used it, and the map couldn't tell where you were going until the doors had made up their minds. So at the minute she hadn't a clue where they were going to end up.

After about thirty seconds they arrived at the second door and they all looked at the map to see where they were, and try to figure out a safe route back to Gryffindor Tower. Now that they knew Filch was out looking for them they really had to play it safe and hope to Merlin they made it back to their common room undiscovered.

Luckily the door had ended up near hers and Harry's Charms classroom. Lyra knew that was on the opposite side of the school to where Filch would be looking for them. She let out a sigh of relief.

"Let's just get back to the common room and forget about this", Harry said sounding tired and stressed. The other three nodded in agreement.

"Draco was never gonna meet us there, he must've tipped Filch off that somebody would be in the trophy room tonight", Lyra said before they left the passage.

"I know", George said, "Can't believe I didn't think of that earlier".

"Yeah, makes sense", Fred agreed, "How else would he have known we were gonna be there at midnight and all?"

"We're all clear", Harry announced, "Let's go".

Sadly getting back to the tower wasn't going to be that simple. They hadn't gotten more than half way up the corridor when a doorknob rattled and something came shooting out of a classroom. Lyra saw immediately that it was Peeves. He was squealing in delight and rubbing his hands together in glee. He'd heard them walking along probably.

"Wandering around at midnight ickle children?" he asked merrily, "Tut, tut, tut! Naughty, naughty, you'll get caughty".

The four of them tried to get around Peeves and continue on their way, but the poltergeist had other ideas about letting them go so easily.

"STUDENTS OUT OF BED!" he bellowed as loud as he could, "STUDENTS OUT OF BED DOWN THE CHARMS CORRIDOR!"

They gave up on stealth the second Peeves started shouting and all out ran for it as fast as their legs would carry them. They ducked under Peeves and hurtled along the corridor into a door at the end that was their only hope left. But it was locked. Lyra shoved the boys out of her way, ripped her wand out from under her sleeve and flicked it at the lock. It clicked and the door swung open. The four of them piled through it and shut it as quick as possible. They pressed their ears against it to listen for Filch.

"Quick Peeves, tell me which way did they go?" he was saying to the mischievous spirit.

"Say please", Peeves said stubbornly.

"Peeves don't mess with me. Where did they go?"

"Shan't say nothing if you don't say please". Peeves said to the caretaker in a singsong voice and Lyra nearly laughed she was so relieved.

"He's not gonna rat us out", she whispered to the boys. They gave her confused looks and focused their attention back on what was happening outside in the corridor.

"Fine – please".

"NOTHING!" Peeves shouted, "Ha haaa! Told you I wouldn't say nothing if you didn't say please! Ha ha ha! Haaa!" After that they heard the sound of Peeves whooshing away and Filch cursing loudly in pure rage.

"Told you", Lyra said to the others with a smug smirk.

"He thinks the door's locked", Harry whispered to them, "I think we'll be okay".

"Umm…guys", Fred said getting the attention of the other three.

"What?" they asked and turned around, seeing exactly, what.

_Oh you've got to be kidding_, Lyra thought. This was way too much on top of everything else that'd happened so far that night. It was just like walking into a nightmare, and Lyra had plenty of experience with that as of late.

Lyra only now realised that they weren't in a room as she'd thought they were. Instead they were in a corridor, the forbidden corridor on the third floor. And they'd just found out why it was meant to be forbidden.

For when she turned around Lyra found herself looking straight into the eyes of a huge, monstrous dog. The dog filled the whole space between the ceiling and floor of the corridor. It had three heads, and three pairs of rolling, mad looking eyes, and three noses, all of which were quivering and twitching in Lyra and her friends' direction. The dog had three drooling mouths filled with sharp, yellowish fangs.

But it was still standing quite still, its six eyes still staring at them and doing nothing else. Lyra knew the only reason the dog hadn't killed them yet was because their sudden entrance had caught it by surprise. Unfortunately for them it was quickly getting over its shock. And there was no way of mistaking what those thunderous growls meant.

She stared at the dog and just as it tensed to lunge at them, surely ending their lives if it caught them with its massive fangs, the door behind them fell open and she tumbled out into the hall with Fred and George. Harry, who had been the one standing at the door jam, slammed the door shut after them. Not even a second after he did so Lyra heard the unmistakable sound of one of the dog's heads colliding with the door.

Once the door was shut the four of them got to their feet once again and ran, almost flew, back down the corridor and didn't slow until they reached the hallway on the seventh floor that would take them to Gryffindor Tower.

Lyra thought that Filch must've rushed off to look for them somewhere else altogether because on their entire way back to the portrait hole they didn't meet him once, and they weren't even using the map. She didn't really care though. All she and her friends cared about at the moment was putting as much distance between them and that monster of a dog.

The four of them didn't stop running until they reached the oil portrait of the Fat Lady who looked shocked and appalled at their sudden arrival. "Where on earth have you four been this time?" she asked them looking disapprovingly at their sweaty, flushed, unsettled faces.

"Never mind that!" Fred yelled at the woman in the painting.

"Pig snout, PIG SNOUT", Harry shouted between pants and the portrait swung forward to let them into the common room. They scrambled through the portrait hole and collapsed into their armchairs around the fire, trembling from their latest ordeal.

It was a while before anyone said something, but once George got his breath back he decided to break the silence, "What're they doing keeping a thing like that locked up in the school?" he asked looking at nothing.

"Yeah", Fred agreed, "if any dog needs exercise, that one does".

Lyra turned her head to look at him incredulously. "That's what you're thinking about?" she asked, "About that thing's exercise routine? Not the fact that it tried to bite our heads off?"

"Why's it there though?" Harry reasoned. "It's a good question".

"Didn't you see what it was standing on?" Lyra asked him thinking he'd noticed it too with how observant he normally is.

"On the floor?" he said back, "I was a bit too preoccupied with its heads to see what its feet were doing". Lyra rolled her eyes. Of course he was.

"It was standing on a trapdoor", she told them, "it's there to guard something. Something pretty damn important".

Harry thought about that for a minute.

"Looks like we know where that package from vault seven hundred and thirteen was taken", he said, and Lyra nodded. She'd been thinking the same thing when she noticed the trapdoor. It was like Hagrid always told them, Gringots is the safest place in the world to put something you wanted to hide, except for Hogwarts.

There was no doubt about it in her mind. Whatever Remus had taken from Gringots was now hidden under that dog. What it was that needed such heavy, risky protections Lyra didn't have a clue. _What_ could be that valuable?


	13. This Is Halloween

**Lyra Black and the Philosopher's Stone**

**A/N** - Hello lovely readers, and welcome to the next installment of the Lyra Black Series! I'd like to let you know that while I'm off school up dates will be somewhat erattic, so I appologise in advance. As usual I'd like to thank my beta, jamber17 for putting up with all my grammer mistakes, and everyone who has read, reviewed, or favourited this story. Knowing that I'm not just writing for myself keeps the chapters coming to me!

**Chapter 13 – This Is Halloween**

The next morning at breakfast Draco Malfoy couldn't believe his eyes at what he saw at the Gryffindor table. Lyra, Harry, Fred and George were all still at Hogwarts, looking tired but perfectly fine. Well as fine as _certain people_ can be in the morning. Actually, by that morning the four of them had started to see the run in with the three headed dog as an excellent adventure and were very keen to have another one like it.

Harry and Lyra had filled the twins in on the mysterious package that had been taken from Gringotts and was now apparently being hidden in the school. They all spent quite a while wondering what could be to need such high protection.

"It's either really dangerous or really valuable," George said.

"Or both," added Fred.

"Well yeah," Lyra agreed, "but that doesn't narrow it down much".

Since all they knew about the package was that it was around two inches long and oddly shaped the list was no shorter than it had been the first day they saw it in Diagon Alley. They had no way of guessing what it was without further clues. But Lyra was sure they'd find out eventually.

The only thing that Lyra really wanted now was a way to get back at Draco, something that'd really piss him off. Luckily for her such a thing arrived in the post only a week later. It looked like she wouldn't have to figure out how to transfigure his hair bright pink after all. Well she might just do that anyway, for future reference.

The owls flooded into the Great Hall as they always did that morning. But that day everyone's attention was caught immediately by a long, very thin package that was being carried by six big screech owls. Lyra was as interested as everyone else in the hall to see who this parcel was for, and was taken aback to see the owls soar down and drop it right in front of Harry, knocking over quite a few things in the process.

They hadn't even fluttered away when another owl swooped down and dropped a letter down on top of the parcel. Harry grabbed that and opened it first, which was lucky, because Lyra read it over his shoulder and it said:

"_DO NOT OPEN THE PARCEL AT THE TABLE_."

Well _that_ was a close one. The twins were just about to do that.

_It's your new Nimbus 2000, but Minnie says you can't let everyone know you've got your own broomstick because they'll all want one. That Oliver Wood bloke will meet you tonight at seven on the Quidditch pitch for your first training session. If he's anything like your father when it comes to Quidditch, I pity you Cub. I truly do._

_Uncle Padfoot._

_P.S. Tell Lyra she's dead. Minnie told me all about her little wrestling match with the Slytherin idiots. _

"Well shit," Lyra groaned after reading the last bit just as Fred said:

"A Nimbus 2000! I've never even touched one".

The foursome left the entrance hall quickly after that, eager to unwrap Harry's new broomstick before their first class. But halfway across the entrance hall they found their way was barred by Crabbe and Goyle. Draco was standing between them glaring at the wrapped parcel.

"That's a broomstick." he stated with a mixture of jealousy and spite on his face. "You'll be in for it this time Potter. First years aren't allowed them".

"It's not any old broomstick Malfoy," George couldn't resist saying, "it's a Nimbus 2000! Best model on the market".

"Now move out of our bloody way." Fred threatened. "Unless you want to end up in the hospital wing for the rest of the week".

Before Draco could retort to that threat, and before Fred and George could follow through with it, Professor Flitwick appeared at Draco's elbow. "Not fighting I hope?" he squeaked, shooting Lyra in particular a warning look. She was sure she'd never live that fight down for the rest of her time at Hogwarts.

"Potter's been sent a broom professor," Draco told the professor quickly.

"Ahh yes, that's right," Flitwick said with a smile, turning to beam at Harry. "Professor McGonagall told me about the special circumstances Mr Potter. What model is it?"

"A Nimbus 2000, sir," Harry told the tiny teacher. "And it's all thanks to Malfoy here that I've gotten it," he added at the end repressing a grin. The look of pure rage and confusion on Draco's face was worth every bit of trouble they'd gotten into because of him. Lyra and the three boys hurried upstairs, smothering their laughter at the blond.

"You're such a cheeky bastard," Fred said, letting out a very undignified snort when they were out of Flitwick's earshot.

"Well it's true," Harry defended himself. "If he didn't steal Neville's Remembrall I wouldn't be on the team".

As the day went on Lyra could easily tell that Harry was having a really hard time trying to keep his mind on their lessons. She knew that his thoughts kept wandering back up to his dormitory, where they'd left his new broom lying under his bed; or off to the Quidditch pitch where he'd be practising with Wood that evening. He was more excited than Lyra had ever seen him at the thought of playing with the team.

After lessons Harry bolted down his dinner without even looking at what he was eating and rushed upstairs with Lyra and the twins in toe to finally unwrap his new Nimbus 2000. Those who didn't know about the broom sent them wary looks as they left the Great Hall. They'd come to expect something bad was going to happen when the four of them were excited about something or rushed off somewhere.

As they ripped the brown paper off the broom in Harry's dormitory, Lyra could feel the excitement coming from the three boys in waves.

"Wow," George sighed in absolute awe as the broom rolled out onto Harry's bed.

"I know," Harry sighed too.

Even Lyra, who next to nothing about different brooms or brooms in general, thought this broom looked wonderful. It was sleek and shiny, with a mahogany handle, a long tail of neat, straight twigs and Nimbus 2000 written in gold near the top.

She sat on Harry's bed and listened to her three friends go on about the different things this broom could do better than any others on the market. They stayed up there talking and going over different Quidditch strategies for most of the evening. Lyra got a few confused looks from some of Harry's dorm mates when they came up to get things for doing homework a few times. They were probably just wondering what a girl was doing up in their dormitory. As far as Lyra knew she really wasn't supposed to be up there at all, but who cares? Surely no one important.

When seven o'clock drew nearer Harry left them and set off into the dusk towards the Quidditch field for his first training session and he didn't get back until much, much later in the night. When Harry did eventually get back from practise he looked both exhausted and delighted. He spent the rest of the night telling Lyra and the twins about how his first session went. Lyra sort of got the feeling that he was still trying to get her to give Quidditch a try, boy was he stubborn. But that's fine, she could be much more so then Harry had ever been in his life.

The next Monday Harry started going to the team practices with the twins three times a week. This gave Lyra a lot of free time that she had to find a way to fill. It was a pretty hard thing for her to deal with. She was used to having someone around her all the time and being on her own wasn't something she adapted to easily at first.

After about a week she ran out of prank ideas that she could actually pull off, and ended up just sitting around in her dormitory bored out of her mind. It was then that she came up with a way to amuse herself during their Quidditch training. So she borrowed Harry's invisibility cloak and nicked every book she could find from the library about Animagi.

It was always something she was interested in doing, becoming an Animagus. Lyra had seen her dad change into a bear sized black dog in an instant many times growing up. And she had seen her aunt Min transform into a small tabby cat in the blink of an eye too many times for her to count. She thought it was amazing, and the very first time she saw her dad transform she made up her mind that she'd be able to do the same someday when she knew enough magic. Since she now had a lot of time on her hands Lyra decided to screw waiting until she learned enough to try it, she was going to teach herself how to make the transformation. It was meant to be really difficult, but she didn't care.

By the time Halloween came around Lyra couldn't believe she'd been at Hogwarts for two whole months. It seemed like hardly any time at all had passed. The fact that their lessons had gotten more interesting since they now knew all the basics might have had something to do with time passing at less of a snail's pace during the week.

There was only one thing that would ruin that day for her: her aunt had informed her that she would be starting her extra lessons the week after Halloween. To say she wasn't looking forward to them would be putting it _very_ lightly.

When Lyra was awoken on Halloween morning by an annoying bushy haired girl she was in no mood to talk about. Once she stopped yelling at said annoying girl and adjusted to being awake, she was at once met with the delicious smell of baking pumpkin wafting around. She discovered, on exiting Gryffindor tower with her friends, that this smell was floating about all around the castle.

What made the morning slightly more bearable for Lyra was that Flitwick announced in their Charms class – first thing that morning – that he thought they were at last ready to start levitating objects. Everyone in the class had been dying to try it since Flitwick had made Neville's toad zoom around the classroom in a demonstration.

He put them into pairs to practise on a feather. Harry and Lyra were already sitting together and gave him a look just daring him to try and separate them. He didn't, though in his mind he was sure that choice would prove to be a mistake.

"Now don't forget that wrist movement we've been practicing!" he squeaked around to the class, perched as usual on top of his pile of books. "Swish and flick, remember, swish and flick," he reminded them all for what was probably the ninetieth time. "And saying the words properly is very important too – don't forget the wizard Baruffio who said 's' instead of 'f' and ended up on the floor with a buffalo on his chest".

Levitating was more difficult then Lyra had expected it to be. Since the Levicorpus spell her parents used was easy for her to pick up Lyra had thought levitating wouldn't be much different. She was wrong. She got impatient after a few minutes of nothing happening and made hers and Harry's feather spontaneously combust. Harry had to use his hat to put it out, no one ever wore them, but Harry had his in his bag for some reason.

"You've got to calm down Ly," Harry admonished her.

"Easier said than done," she muttered to herself, glaring at the new feather Flitwick gave them venomously.

"Look, just watch," Harry told her and raised his wand to the new feather, "Wingardium Leviosa" he said and swished and flicked his wand. The feather rose gently from the desk and hovered in the air for a moment before rising higher and higher into the air. Harry turned to give Lyra a triumphant look. She stuck her tongue out at him.

"Oh well done!" Flitwick cried on noticing Harry's moving feather. "Everyone see here, Mr Potter's done it!"

Harry was the only one in the class to make his feather move that day. He was surprised that Lyra hadn't been able to do the same. Flitwick told the rest of them that they just needed practise. Lyra was quite annoyed at not being able to get such a simple spell. Harry tried to assure her that she just needed to work a little harder at it, but she still wasn't very happy about having such trouble with Charms. It really wasn't her best, or favourite, subject.

But after she walked into the Great Hall for dinner all thoughts about charms were discarded from her mind instantly. The hall was fully decked out for Halloween and it was amazing. The teachers really went all out for it. There were well over a thousand live bats fluttering around from the walls and ceiling. And a thousand more swooped around lower, just above the tables, in enormous black clouds, making the candles that lit the hall stutter and flicker. Jackal lanterns were floating in the air along with the usual candles casting an eerie glow about the hall.

The feast appeared suddenly as it had at the start of term banquet in September. It all looked as delicious as Lyra had been hoping it would. She and Harry dug into the food as the twins slid into seats next to them and helped themselves too.

About five minutes into the feast Professor Quirrell, the Muggle Studies teacher, came sprinting into the hall, his turban askew and terror etched onto his face. Everyone stared at the teacher and his abnormal entrance until he reached Dumbledore's chair and slumped against the table in front of the headmaster.

He gasped out one sentence with his voice trembling: "Troll – in the dungeons – thought you'd like to know", and then he sank into a dead faint and crumpled to the marble floor.

The hall was silent for about thirty seconds, and then there was uproar. It took several booming purple firecrackers exploding from Dumbledore's wand to bring silence to the hall once again.

"Prefects, lead your Houses back to the dormitories immediately!" he commanded in his rumbling voice.

The Weasley twins' older brother Percy was in his bossy element, "Follow me! Stick together, first years! No need to fear the troll if you follow my orders! Stay close behind me, now. Excuse me, make way, I'm a Prefect!"

Naturally Lyra Harry, Fred and George didn't pay attention to a single thing he or the teachers said, though they probably should've that evening.

"How did a troll get in?" Harry wondered as they climbed the stairs of one of their secret passages to Gryffindor Tower.

"I dunno," Lyra answered him, she was just as confused as he was, "they're _supposed_ to be extremely stupid".

"Someone had to let it in," George said from ahead of the younger two.

"But who'd do something like that?" Harry asked.

"Don't ask me," Fred said with a shrug.

"Maybe it was Peeves who let it in, as a bit of a Halloween joke," George suggested, but Lyra knew he didn't really believe that himself. Peeves was a nuisance, but he wouldn't do something that would actually endanger the students.

As they passed through the tapestry exit on the sixth floor Lyra smelled something so foul she nearly lost her dinner when it assaulted her senses. It was worse than anything Lyra had ever smelled before. It was almost like a mixture of old, sweaty socks and the kind of public toilets that no one ever seems to be bothered cleaning.

She had trouble stopping herself gagging so she could ask her friends, "Can you smell something?"

And it was then they heard it, a low grunting noise and the shuffling footsteps of massive feet. Harry pointed and Lyra saw it coming towards them from the other end of the corridor. The four of them tried to get back to the secret passage way as it approached them, moving much faster now that it had found targets.

Lyra finally got a good look at the thing when it stepped into a patch of moonlight and she wished she hadn't. It was a horrible sight to behold. The troll was twelve feet tall; its skin was a dull, dirty granite grey; and its great big lumpy body plodded along towards them, dwarfing its small bald head that was perched precariously on its shoulders. The beast had short stubby looking legs that were as thick as tree trunks and ended in flat, horned feet.

The smell coming from it was awful, and it got worse the closer it got to the foursome. Lyra was dismayed to see that it was holding a huge wooden club, which was being dragged along the stone floor because its arms were so long and bandy.

Lyra was starting to panic. How the hell were they supposed to fend off a fully grown troll all by themselves? It was impossible. She could see that her friends were just as panicked as she was.

As the troll slouched nearer and nearer to them Lyra's brain started working ten times as fast as it normally did and everything else around her seemed to slow down. She could feel her heart pounding, sending adrenaline around her body. Her eyes took in everything around her in less than two seconds. And suddenly she knew what to do.

She ran over to a suit of armour at the opposite wall of the hallway and knocked it over, making as much noise as possible. Her friends stared at her, confused as to what the fuck she thought she was doing.

"Make as much noise as you can!" she bellowed over to them as the troll, getting distracted from the other three from the racket she was making swerved in her direction, "Distract it! It'll get confused!"

It clicked with her friends that she was right, and if they were lucky someone would hear them and come help. Harry ran to the end of the hall and picked up two metal plaques that were mounted on the wall and started clanging them together with as hard as he could. George took the trolls distraction at Lyra and Harry to slip past it and dash to the other end of the hall, his hurried footsteps echoing around and bouncing off the walls. Fred started casting banging spells, blasting spells and every other one he could think of that made lots of noise. George started doing the same when he got to the end of the hall.

When the troll roared, aggravated and confused, it lunged for Lyra, who was the closest and had no way of escaping. Harry gave up on making noise and threw the plaques at the troll and yelled at it. The thing turned around and went for Harry, raising its club to smash him to pieces. Harry didn't know what to do; he was stuck at the end of a corridor and the only way out was on the other side of the twelve foot mountain advancing on him.

Seeing the troll about to kill Harry Lyra's mind went into panic and she raised her wand and cried out the first spell that came into her head, "Wingardium Leviosa!" she yelled. _Wait! What the hell! I can't even do that spell!_ she thought to herself.

But surprisingly its club was wrenched out of its hands and hovered in the air for a moment. It looked around stupidly looking for its club, confused as to where it went. Lyra didn't even think about what she did next, she just did it. She still had control over the club so she made it swing back and whack the troll over the head as hard as it possibly could. The troll fell to the ground flat on its face with a thud that made the whole corridor, maybe even the whole floor, shake.

Harry walked slowly over to inspect the troll, as did Lyra and the twins. They were all trembling and staring at the thing wide eyed. Lyra looked at what she'd done, dropping the club next to its owner as she approached it.

It was Fred that spoke first, "Is it – you know – dead?" he asked.

"I don't know," Harry said, looking at the massive gash on its head that was pumping blood faster than any wound Lyra had ever seen.

"I think I can see its brain," George observed, repulsed.

"I think you're right," Lyra agreed, crouching down to inspect the wound she'd made, "its skull is cracked at least," she told them making a disgusted face.

They were torn from their inspection of the troll by a sudden slamming of doors and thundering of footsteps echoing down the hallway. Lyra guessed their noise had drawn attention to them, but it was too late. Because now she was kneeling on the ground next to the troll's head – and getting covered in still warm blood she realised – with the three boys crouched next to her also getting soaked in red. To say they were in a bad situation to get found in was an understatement.

Not a moment later three professors tore around the corner. Lyra's aunt Minerva strode toward the scene looking like a raging bull seeing a red flag waved in its face. She was closely followed by Snape and Remus, with Quirrell reluctantly bringing up the rear. Quirrell took one glance at the fallen troll and quickly sat down on the pedestal belonging to the knocked over suit of armour, letting out a pitiful whimper and clutching his heart. The other three teachers had already gotten over the troll and had moved onto staring open-mouthed at the four students that were crouched over it covered in blood. They had also realised who those students were.

Lyra had never seen her aunt so angry before, not even when her and Harry destroyed the Great Hall. Her lips were pressed into a thin, nearly invisible white line. Any thoughts Lyra had about not getting into trouble over this were promptly thrown out of her mind the moment she laid eyes on her aunt's face.

"What were you four thinking?" she asked her voice shaking with a fiery fury, "You're all lucky you weren't killed! Why aren't you in your dormitory?"

Snape gave them all a piercing look. Remus looked disappointed but relieved at the same time. Lyra looked back down at the troll. She guessed by the amount of blood it lost, and the fact that she could clearly see its brain, that it was dead by now.

"We didn't mean to find the troll!" George defended himself and his friends.

"Yeah," Fred joined him, "And we were heading to the dormitory when we did". The twins were obviously not going to let the teachers put them in the wrong when they'd done nothing wrong this time.

"It attacked us," Harry continued, "and we tried to confuse it".

"Then it went for Harry," Fred added.

"And this happened," George finished gesturing to the dead troll.

"And you have no idea how it died?" Snape asked incredulously.

The boys didn't know what to say to that, but they all sent a quick glance at Lyra who shook her head almost unnoticeably at them. But it was useless, that look was enough for the teachers to know she was the one that killed it.

"Well," Minerva said after a lengthy pause, "I still say you were lucky, but not many students could have taken on a full-grown mountain troll and lived to tell the tale. You each win Gryffindor ten points. Dumbledore will be informed of this. Now if you're not hurt you'd better be heading off to Gryffindor Tower. The rest of the students are finishing the feast in the common room".

The four of them stood up and hurried down the corridor and up the passage hidden behind the tapestry. They walked up the passage in silence. None of them felt like speaking, and when around the twins that was a rarity. Lyra thought it was quite a relief to be away from the smell of troll at least as they climbed farther away from the horrid stench.

Harry finally spoke when they reached the exit leading to the Tower. "We should've gotten more than ten points," he grumbled.

"Ten points each," Fred corrected as they neared the portrait of the Fat Lady.

"My Goodness!" the woman in the portrait exclaimed in horror. "What happened to you all?" she questioned looking disgusted.

Lyra looked down at her clothes and hands, and saw that they were soaked in crimson blood, so were her friends'. She glanced behind her and sure enough they'd been dripping the liquid all the way up there.

"Shit," she cursed to herself and whipped out her wand again. She quickly preformed a cleaning spell on herself and the three boys before they entered the common room. Most people there would probably think it was fake, part of some Halloween joke, but Lyra would rather avoid any questions about their dripping blood. "None of your business," she retorted to the portrait.

"Pig Snout," Harry said the password ignoring the Fat Lady's expression of insult.

"Young lady –"she began to give out to Lyra, completely ignoring that Harry had provided that password.

"Pig Snout!" Lyra shouted, getting impatient with the Fat Lady. The portrait looked quite alarmed by the young girl and swung open immediately to let them enter.

They scrambled in through the portrait hole and grabbed some of the food that was set out on tables around the common room. The four of them sat at a table in the corner of the room and let out a collective sigh of relief.

"Bloody fucking hell," George said.

"Couldn't have put it better myself," Fred agreed.

"Why does everything happen to us?" Harry asked no one in particular.

"I've got no idea," Lyra said. "But why's it always me that always ends up beating the shit out of people?"

"Because you're the most aggressive person we know," the twins said at the same time.

"Thanks," Lyra said with a roll of her eyes.

They spent the rest of Halloween night sitting around the common room chatting amongst themselves. They had planned a brilliant and incredibly elaborate prank for that night, but after the incident with the troll no one in the school would've been able to take any more excitement. Even they weren't in the mood for one after their latest little adventure. And that was _really_ saying something.

And Lyra could tell that Harry wasn't really that into it in the first place. She'd known since that morning he wouldn't want to. He always spent Halloween thinking about his parents. This year she had been able to distract him, but she knew that once Harry was alone he'd be at it again. She just hoped that he wouldn't be depressed for the next week over it; Lyra hated seeing Harry so upset.

The next day people were still a bit shaken up over the troll break in. But everything that had been broken by it was fixed and the blood was cleaned away. With no signs of its former presence in the school left, they got over it pretty quickly. Lyra didn't get over Halloween quite as quickly as everyone around her. Every time she looked in a mirror for weeks afterwards she could see its blood staining her hands. At first this freaked the shit out of her, but she got used to it after a few days. She did try to avoid mirrors as often as she could though.


	14. Sorry, It's just an Author's Note

Hey, I'm sorry this isn't an actual chapter, and I'm sorry I haven't updated since last year. There are a few reasons for this, the first being that I'm in my last year of school and my Leaving Cert (the Irish final exams) is fast approaching. The second is that in my head I've completely changed this story over the past couple of months. I know I've done this before, but this time around I think I'm finally happy with the way I've laid things out. So, I'm going to be taking down this story and its predecessor and posting a sample of the new and improved version as soon as I can manage.

~Pixi.


	15. Preview

**A/N - I told you guys I'd put up something from the new story as soon as I could, so here it is. I know it's not much, but it's the only properly editied part of the first chapter. As you can probably tell, I've changed a lot, for one Lyra doesn't live with Harry, Remus or Sirius. And the thing is, I've made Lyra older, she's the same age as Fred and George. Because this is following Lyra through her time at hogwarts, Harry won't actually make an appearance until she's in third year. I've also changed her relationship with Alal a bit, but I'm not going to tell you how, you'll find out later on. Anyway, here it is. **

The Lyra Bennet Series.

Lyra Bennet and the Marauder's Map.

Chapter 1

There's no such thing as normalcy.

Lyra Bennet never had what you would consider an ordinary existence for many reasons. The most obvious of these would be the fact that Lyra was a witch. Not only that, she was a witch raised in the only all-magical village in the UK. Unlike most children, magical or Muggle, Lyra spent her childhood running around shops with sweets that burned your tongue and pubs filled with everything from half-giants to hags. She grew up in the most idealistic, eccentric village imaginable.

Lyra herself appeared to most, to be an ordinary child. She was small for her age, sporting the pale complexion associated with living in the Arctic Circle, and spent most of her time in the typical baggy clothes of a tom-boy. But her strong, aristocratic features gave her an unusual prettiness and imposing presence, despite her small stature. Devious as they come, Lyra always loved having fun at others' expense, and today was no exception.


End file.
